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the gambridfle CiteratMre Series. 

EDITED BY 

THOMAS HALL, JR., A.B., 

INSTRUCTOR IK ENGLISH IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY. 



Ube 

Cambriboe Xit;evature Series 



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THOMAS HALL, Jr., A3,, 

Harvard University, General Editor. 



RAYMOND M, ALDEN, Ph.D., Leland Stanford, Jr., Uni- 
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[Sl] 



Xlbe Cambci&ge literature Sertes 
THE 

SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY 
PAPERS 

FROM THE SPECTATOR 



EDITED BY 

FREDERICK LEROY BLISS, A.M. 

PRINCIPAL OF DETROIT UNIVERSITY SCHOOL 
AND 

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TEACHER OF ENGLISH, DETROIT UNIVERSITY SCHOOL 



01) nolX ak'Ka noli) 



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THE LIBRARY OF 
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Two Comes Recsiveo 

SfP. 6 1902 

C<"*>S^l»mMT ENTRY 

-.;SS £:t/XXc. No, 
COPY 3. 



Copyright, 1902, 
Bv Frederick L. Bjliss. 



Stanbope Press 

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BOSTON, U.S.A. 



PEEFACE. 



The papers here represented do not include 
every one that contains a reference to Sir Roger, 
but only those best and most favorably known, 
and of greatest interest. Acknowledgment is due 
the Lippincott Company for permission to use the 
printed text of their edition of Addison's Essays 
from Tlie Spectator^ edited by G. W. Greene. 
This text was compared with Morley's edition, 
modified to conform with it when necessary, with 
such changes in punctuation and capitalization 
as accord with present usage. Morley has been 
followed also in the translation of the mottoes. 
These translations have been placed inconspicu- 
ously with the notes, for Addison and Steele 
themselves refused to translate the mottoes, which 
were intended only for those who could under- 
stand and appreciate the allusion. 



oo]srTE]srTs. 



Introduction 

Joseph Addison Yii 

Sir Richard Steele xii 

Eustace Budgell xvii 

Conditions of the Time xviii 

The Tatler, the Spectator and the 

Guardian . xxi 

Suggestions xxviii 

Bibliography xxxi 

Sir Roger de Coverlet Papers 1 

Notes 229 



ESTTEODUOTION. 



JOSEPH ADDISON. 

(1672-1719.) 

Of Joseph Addison's mother, unfortunately, we know 
very little. His father, Rev. Lancelot Addison, was a 
man of scholarly tastes, high principles, and independence 
of character. When, during the Puritan ascendancy, his 
Royalist and Church-of-England sympathies Ijrought him 
into disfavor, he sacrificed his comfort rather than his 
conscience. After the Restoration he enjoyed several 
preferments, the last and most consideraljle being the 
Deanery of Lichfield. The little rectory at Milston, Wilt- 
shire, was the birthplace of Joseph, his two brothers, and 
three sisters. 

At the age of fourteen Joseph entered Charterhouse 
School, London, then second in reputation only to West- 
minster, among English schools. Here he distinguished 
himself in his classical studies, which were, indeed, the 
foundation stones of his later literary work. It Avas here, 
too, that he formed the most intimate and lasting friend- 
ship of his life — that with " Dick " Steele. 



Vlll INTRODUCTION. 

From Charterhouse, Addison Avent to Oxford and con- 
tinued his studies first at Queen's College and later at Mag- 
dalen, where in 1698 he became a Fellow. During this 
time his translations from the Latin won him a name and 
brought him to the notice of that ezar of English letters, 
John Dryden, It was during these years also that Addi- 
son formed an acquaintance with Charles Montagu, after- 
wards Lord Halifax. AVhen the time came for Addison 
to choose his life-work, Montagu helped him to a decision, 
for it was through Montagu's influence that Addison was 
granted a pension in order that he might fit himself for 
diplomatic service by travel on the Continent. 

The years 1699-1703 Addison spent in France, Italy, 
Germany, Switzerland, and Holland, j)erfecting his knowl- 
edge of foreign tongues, profiting by his contact with such 
men as Boileau and Malebranche, and everywhere observ- 
ing with The SiJectator'' s eye, men, manners, institutions. 

Before Addison returned to England, the death of Wil- 
liam HI. put an end to the hope of any immediate i:)oliti- 
cal advancement. Anne, upon coming to the throne, 
gave evidence of her Stuart blood by overturning the 
Whig ministry (including Addison's patrons, Halifax and 
Somers) and replacing it with men who she thought 
would uphold tlu; prerogative of the crown. Circum- 
stances, however, made it impossible for the ministry to 
follow a rigid Tory policy, and Godolphin, Lord Treas- 
urer, soon saw the necessity of allying to the government 
the Whig influence, both j^olitical and literary. We must 



INTRODUCTION. ix 

realize that in Addison's time the mutual dependence 
of literature and politics was still very great. Litera- 
ture was only just beginning to seek its support in 
the demand of the reading public, rather than in the 
patronage of the great ; and, on the other hand, the gov- 
ernment needed the weapon which the pamphleteer and 
occasional poet wielded. Thus it was tliat Addison, who 
was living in obscurity in the Haymarket, was sought 
out to celebrate in verse the great victory of Blenheim, 
and we have as a result The Campaign. This poem War- 
ton calls " a gazette in rhyme." 

It is true that it is remembered chiefly as marking Ad- 
dison's rise and likewise the rise of the Whig party. 
Addison was made successively Under-Secretary of State, 
member of Parliament, secretar}^ to the Lord-lieutenant of 
Ireland. In 1710 the Whig power was again overthrown 
with the downfall of Godolphin and Marlborough, and 
Addison was deprived of his official position. So popular 
was he, however, that he was returned to Parliament with- 
out contest. At this time Swift wrote to Stella of Addi- 
son, "I believe if he had a mind to be king he would 
hardly be refused." 

One more revolution in party government, at the time 
of Anne's death, placed Addison on the crest of the wave, 
and in 1717 he became Secretary of State. The year be- 
fore he had married the Countess Dowager of Warwick 
and taken up his residence in tlie famous Holland House. 

During these years Addison had been a man of letters, 



X INTRODUCTION. 

as well as a man of affairs. His literary work outside his 
contributions to periodicals took the dramatic form. Rosa- 
mond, an unsuccessful opera, appeared in 1706 ; Cato, a 
tragedy, in 1713. Though Cato contains some fine lines 
and elicited from Voltaire the eulogium that Addison was 
"the first English writer who composed a regular tra- 
gedy," it is now thought to have little merit. The inter- 
est which it aroused upon its appearance was largely due 
to Addison's personal popularity and to the allusion to con- 
temporary political conditions which the play was sup- 
posed to contain. Addison's third dramatic attempt was 
The Drummer, acted in 1716. 

Addison's genius was, however, not dramatic or poetic. 
We remember him not for his Cato, his Campaign, or even 
his l)eautiful paraphrase of the Twenty-third Psalm. 
It is as tlie delightful essayist that he occupies a high 
place in our literature. His essays are valued not for the 
matter so much as for the manner. The thought con- 
tained in them is not profound nor often original ; he 
does not sound tlie depths of our nature, but he has no 
rival in perfection of form — correctness, absolute trans- 
parency, easy and unaffected grace. We do not care 
what he says so long as he says it. Hardly less do we 
value his essays for the charming personality which 
breatlies through them. That personality which drew all 
men to him in his lifetime ; whose power exacted tribute 
from Swift while he scoffed, and from Pope while he 
sneered, still holds sway over us. Its elements, so far as 



INTRODUCTION. xi 

we can analyze them, are evenness of temper, modera- 
tion, reason, and justice as guiding principles in the con- 
duct of life ; refinement of feeling, a high moral sense ; 
and, not least, a delicate, subtle, all-pervading humor, 
which never Ijecomes coarse or malicious. In a word, he 
has perfect poise of character. Macaulay says his tone 
"is that of a gentleman, in whom the quickest sense of 
the ridiculous is constantly tempered by good-nature and 
good-breeding." 

To turn from the man to his work, it is significant that 
both Addison's and Steele's best writing was done during 
their literary partnership. This association began in 
Steele's first venture in periodical literature. The Tatler. 
Shortly after this paper appeared, and Addison recognized 
Steele's hand, he offered to contribute to the paper, an 
offer Steele was not slow to accept. Thus began the co- 
operation which bore such rich fruit in The Sj^eciator. 
The papers which Addison and Steele later pul^lished 
alone, Addison's Freeholder and Steele's Englif^hman, 
though affording us excellent examples of the power of 
the men as political writers, do not show either genius at 
its best. 

The years 1716-17 mark the height of Addison's pros- 
perity, but thougli still a young man, he did not live long 
to enjoy his success. Ill health forced him to give up his 
Secretaryship after holding it less than a year, and a few 
months later, June 17, 1719, he died. His last days were 
saddened by the estrangement of his old friend, an 



Xli INTRODUCTION. 

estrangement which arose in political differences, but 
which fed upon those very contrasts in character that had 
first drawn them together and afterward made them so 
mutually helpful. There are evidences that, in spite of 
the alienation, these two men really loved each other to 
the end. Let us believe that it was so. 

Addison was buried in Westminster Abbey, where the 
Spectator, when "in a serious humor," loved to walk by 
himself. 

SIR RICHARD STEELE. 

(1672-1729.) 
"I am an Englishman born in the city of Dublin," 
says Steele of himself. Beyond this little is known of his 
parentage and early life. It is only recently that the uat*. 
of his birth has been fixed as March 12, 1672. All the 
biographers can say of Steele's father is that he was an 
attorney, and some add (on insufficient evidence) private 
secretary to the Duke of Ormond. Steele tells us nothing 
of the character of his father, and the following sentence 
(Tatler, No. 181) explains his silence: " The first sense 
of sorrow I ever knew was upon the death of my father, 
at which time I was not quite five years old." A few lines 
further occurs the only reference to his mother, ' ' a very 
beautiful woman of a noble spirit." From the same 
passage we learn something of Steele himself, for he tells 
us that at sight of his mother's grief, sorrow ' ' seized my 
very soul and has made pity the weakness of my heart 
ever since.'''' ^, 



IN TR OD UC TION. xiii 

Steele's mother died not long- after his father and left 
the boy under the guardianship of an uncle, who was 
priv^ate secretary to the Duke of Ormond. Through the 
Duke's influence Steele was admitted to Charterhouse in 
1684. There is little to record of his school days. They 
seem to have been happy and profitable, and memorable 
chiefly for the beginning of the friendship with Joseph 
Addison, who entered the school two years later than 
Steele. Thackeray, in his English Humorists, has given 
us a delightful picture of the schoolboy friends, — " that 
thick-set, square-faced, black-eyed, soft-hearted little Irish 
boy, who was very idle, got other boys to do his lessons 
for him, was always in del)t to the tartwoman, and who 
was withal the servile admirer of Joseph Addison, the 
' "jd^ boy," (Tliackeray seems not to know, or not to 
remember, that Steele entered two years before Addison.) 
" He ran on Addison's messages, fagged for him and 
blacked his shoes. To be in Joe's company was Dick's 
greatest pleasure ; and he took a sermon or a caning from 
his monitor with the most boundless reverence, acquies- 
cence, and affection." In reading this, we must remember 
that Thackeray himself admits that he draws upon his 
imagination for the sketch. Such, in his opinion, Dick 
Steele, the boy, must have been to become Richard Steele, 
the man. Has Thackeray, however, the true conception 
of the man ? He sees in Steele a cliaracter to be loved 
an*l excused, rather than admired. " If he is not our 
friend, he is nothing." Later biographers make him 



XIV INTRODUCTION. 

something more than a man of generous but ill-controlled 
impulses, content to remain Addison's fag through life. 
They find, upon comparing the two men, that Steele has 
not only the warmer nature, the deeper sympathy, the 
greater energy and enthusiasm, but also the more original 
genius, for Steele is the pioneer, Addison the disciple. 

Steele entered Oxford two years later than Addison and 
chose another college — Christ Church. The difference 
in character between the two friends early evinced itself. 
In 1694, while Addison was content to pursue his college 
course, Steele's longing for a life of action led him to enlist 
as private in the Horse Guards. A few years later he 
became Cai)tain Steele and with this title left the army after 
twelve years' service. 

In 1701, when Steele's military career was a little more 
than half over, appeared his Christian Hero. This treatise 
was not at first intended for publication, but was designed, 
according to the author's own statement, "to fix ujion 
his own mind a strong impression of virtue and religion, in 
opposition to a stronger propensity towards unwarrantable 
pleasures." In that age, it was remarkable not that he 
should have had this "propensity towards vmwarrantable 
])leasures,'' but that he should have tliought necessary to 
resist it. As to the impression the work made, Steele says, 
"From being thought no undelightful companion, I was 
soon reckoned a disagreeable fellow." 

In part, at least, to offset this impression, Steele next 
essayed a comed3% The Funeral, or Grief a la Mode. 



INTRODUCTION. XV 

Even this has a distinctly othieal purpose, for he declares 
he shall show Virtue and Vice just as they appear in the 
world. He is evidently willing, however, that a certain 
lively humor shall make the dose palatable. Steele con- 
tinues the warfare against the existing drama in his sub- 
sequent plays, The Lying Lovers, The Tender Ihisband, 
The Conscious Lovers, and in several of his essays. Though 
The Conscious Lovers has some merit, we cannot call 
Steele a successful dramatist. 

Soon after Addison's return from tlie Continent, Steele 
was married. Almost the only circumstance recorded in 
connection with this marriage is that his wife brought him 
an estate in the Barbadoes. She lived less than two years 
after their marriage, and in 1707 Steele married again — 
Mary Scurlock, a W(dsh beauty, the " charming Prue '^ of 
his letters. These letters, written at all times and from all 
places from the days of the courtship to his wifc^'s death, 
are the chief source of information with regard to Steele's 
mature life. In them the great and the petty jostle each 
other as they do in life. We come face to face with the 
man as he is, perplexed by money diiliculties, allured by 
financial will-o'-the-wisps or political ambitions ; cast into 
despair at a caprice of "True"; stumbling, sinning, but 
always n^pentant and ashamed; keen, energetic, im- 
pulsive ; moved by strong feeling and as strong conviction ; 
tender hearted, withal, and generous; to the last, an 
ardent patriot, a loyal friend, a devoted lover. 

Steele's first connection with ])olitics was established 



xvi INTRODUCTION. 

short!}' Jifter his first marriage, when he became gentle- 
man-in-waiting to Prince George. Later, in 17U7, he was 
made Gazetteer, that is, editor, we might say, of The 
Gazette, the official organ of the government. It was the 
monopoly of news which The Gazette possessed that sug- 
gested to him the idea of publishing a periodical on his 
own account : thus The Tatler came into being. Of this 
paper and its two chief successors. The Guardian and 
The Spectator, we have treated elsewhere. It is necessary 
here only to note that each of these projects originated 
with Steele. 

After tlie death of his second periodical, The Guardian, 
Steele became more and more deeply involved in politics. 
He entered Parliament, but during the Tory ascendancy 
could not refrain from making public in a pamplilet ( The 
Crisis) liis criticism of the Administration, and in conse- 
quence was expelled from the House. At this time, also, 
he was publishing The Englishman, a distinctly party 
organ. The return of the Whigs to power at the accession 
of George I. reinstated Steele in favor, as it did Addison. 
He again entered Parliament, and on the occasion of an 
address to the king was rewarded with the order of knight- 
hood. Further favor was shown in the bestowal upon him 
of the patent of Drury Lane Theatre. This, however, he 
lost later when lie openly and courageously expressed his 
disapproval of a pending ministerial measure, the Peerage 
Bill (1719). It was the difference of opinion over this bill 
that estranged Steele and Addison. 



INTRODUCTION. xvii 

Steele's writings during this period and later took the 
form chiefly of political pamphlets and short-lived papers. 
Of the former the most celebrated is his Apology for him- 
self and his writings. Two purely literary works of this 
period, however, deserve mention; one. The Conscious 
Lovers, which has been spoken of before ; the other, a ven- 
ture along the lines of The Spectator — The Lover, which 
had but a brief career. 

During the last years of his life Steele's financial embar- 
rassments thickened, yet it is thouglit that, in spite of fail- 
ing health and waning i^owers, lie met all obligations 
before his death, " Prue'' had died in 1718. Steele sur- 
vived her eleven years. 

"There may have been wiser, stronger, greater men. 
But many a strong man would have been stronger for a 
touch of Steele's indulgent sympathy ; many a great man 
has wanted his genuine largeness of heart ; many a wise 
man might learn something from his deep and wide 
humanity." — Austin Dobson. 



EUSTACE BUDGELL. 

(1685-1736.) 

The biography of Eustace Budgell is brief and unhe- 
roic. His life was a promise never fulfilled. His birth- 
place was St. Thomas, near Exeter ; his college, Oxford. 
When Addison, to whom he was related, went to Ireland, 



xviii INTRODUCTION. 

he took young Bndgcll witli liini as hi.-; secretary, and later 
obtained a government position for him. BudgelVs con- 
tributions to the periodicals in which Steele and Addison 
were interested show considerable literary ability, or 
rather susceptibility, his style bearing a distinct impress 
of Addison's. But he seems to haye been cursed with a 
wayward disposition. While he was under the guidance of 
Addison, who loved him, his life was fairly well regulated, 
but, after Addison's death, became sadly entangled. Finan- 
cial diiVicuItics, political disapi)ointments, failure in his 
profession (law), social obloquy, as a result of his own 
dishonesty and a cutting couplet from Pope, made his life 
unendurable. He ended it by leaping into the Thames. 
In his room was found a paper reading: "What Cato 
did and Addison approved cannot be wrong.'' This last 
pathetic conclusion was a false one, for Addison makes 
clear in his Cato that he does not approve of self murder. 
Thus Budgell's death was the crowning mistake of a life 
of many mistakes. 

CONDITIONS OF THE TIME. 

To understand tlie conditions out of which The Specta- 
tor sprang, and with wiiich it wrought, we must consider 
first that tlie last fifty years of the seventeenth century 
had seen three revolutions in England. With the execu- 
tion of Charles I., England had thrown off the yoke of 
Stuart tyranny. But the despotism of Puritan rule be- 



IN TR on U C TI ON. xix 

came as irksome as that of Charles, after CromwelPs per- 
sonality no longer gave life and vigor to it, and in turn it 
was cast off. After the stern repression of Puritanism 
came the Restoration (1660), a period marked by an ex- 
cess and frivolity such as England has seen but once. But 
Charles II. was not serious enough in anything to arouse 
the antagonism of the English people. It was not until 
the old hated Stuart traits began to reveal themselves in 
James II., particularly the old leaning toward Catholi- 
cism, most hated of all, that England once more arose in 
her might and declared she had had enougli. A third 
revolution in 1688 — ("the revolution without blood- 
shed ") — deposed James and placed William of Orange 
and Mary on the throne. 

Even then the balance was not restored, nor could it 
be by a foreigner. Society was still awry when Anne, 
who was, as she said, " entirely English,'' came to the 
throne. During her rule the sense of security gave free 
rein to discussion, and this brought to light violent antag- 
onisms in opinion, which Ijefore had had little chance to 
express themselves. The old elements were there, though 
modified by time and experience : the Roundhead had 
become a Whig ; the Cavalier a Tory. Between these 
two parties raged the most intense and bitter warfare. 

How this strife influenced literary activity has already 
been shown. It was the golden age of the pamphleteer 
and the satirist. Pope's stinging couplets ruined many a 
reputation, and even Swift's intellect, the mightiest of the 
Augustan age, was lent to the service of politics. 



XX INTRODUCTION. 

AVith regard to what we may call pure literature — lit- 
erature which has "no axe to grind'' — public taste was 
in a chaotic condition. Literary expression was still 
cramped as the result of Puritanic prohibitions, and that 
which did flourish was seared with the licentiousness of 
the Restoration. It took the form chiefly of the drama, 
and was addressed to a comparatively small circle, made 
up of those who clustered about the court. It had little 
effect, fortmiately, upon the mass of tlie peojjle, for we must 
remember that communication betw een the different parts 
of the kingdom w^as dilhcult and slow, and printed matter 
did not circulate so quickly or so widely as to-day ; the 
post and the newspaper were young and very crude. 

There were forces at work, however, which made for 
the improvement of public taste. In the first place, the 
almost continuous ascendancy of Whig principles from the 
revolution of 1688, with brief interruptions during Anne's 
reign, was un(piestionably beneficial in its effects upon 
conditions. The strength of the Whigs was in the city, 
among the commercial class ; the strength of the Tories 
in the country, among the landed proprietors. Whig rule 
meant, then, power in the hands cf the middle class and 
greater consideration for the welfare of that class. This 
is the period of the establishment of the great free or charity 
schools, such as St. Margaret's, the Green Coat School, 
the Westminster Blue Coat, etc. ; in other words, educa- 
tion was becoming more general. Moreover, mechanical 
improvements in the art of printing were operating to 



INTRODUCTION. xxi 

lower the price of books and therefore increase the num- 
ber. 

Thus, there was a considerable and constantly growing 
part of the English people neither frivolous and licentious 
nor ignorant. Out of this class, together with fashionable 
society, Steele and Addison created their reading pul^lic. 
Moreover, to Swift's cynical disgust, they were the first to 
recognize women as an important and intelligent part of 
that reading public, to be interested, amused, and instructed. 



THE TATLER, THE SPECTATOR, AND THE 
GUARDIAN. 

The Taller, as we have seen, had its birth in Steele's 
mind while he was enjoying the advantages of the office 
of Gazetteer. There had been many periodicals before 
The Taller, but only Defoe's Weekly Bevieiv of the Affairs 
of France, or John Dunton's Athenian Mercury, can be 
considered in any sense the prototype of a paper chiefly 
literary in its tone. 

The first number of The Taller appeared April 12, 1709. 
The first four numbers were issued gratis ; after that a 
charge of one penny was made. The paper came out 
three times a week, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, 
"for the convenience of the post." 

Addison had nothing to do with the paper until the 
eighteenth number, and until the appearance of No. 6, did 



XXll INTRODUCTION. 

not even guess the identity of its author. For Steele had 
taken a name made familiar by Swift in his ridiculous 
attack upon an almanac-maker, one John Partridge, and 
issued his ' ' Lucubrations " in the name of Isaac Bicker- 
staff, Esq., astrologer. The name, associated with the 
pamphlets that had kept all London in a roar of laughter, 
at once bespoke popular favor for Steele's enterju-ise. 
The title of the paper, Steele slyly explains, was chosen 
" in honor of the fair sex,'' whom he hopes to entertain. 

The subject-matter was to be arranged under five heads 
(see note on coffee-liouses, p. 4,23). The aim of the paper 
was not stated until the first numbers were published in 
a volume. Then, in the dedication, Steele expresses it 
thus: "to expose the false arts of life, to pull off the 
disguises of cunning, vanity, and affectation, and to 
recommend a general simplicity in our dress, our dis- 
course, and our behavior." Such the aim of The Tdllcr 
had come to be. 

The Tatler's career came to an end suddenly January, 
1711, after having run through 271 numbers. The osten- 
sible reason for terminating its existence so abruptly was 
that the disguise of Bickerstaff had been penetrated. The 
more probable explanation is that Steele was in danger of 
incurring the enmity of political leaders on account of 
certain articles that had appeared in The Tailcr. 

However this may be. The Spectator, which appeared 
INIarch 1, 1711, just three months after the death of The 
Tatler, states: "I am resolved to observe an exact neu- 



INTRODUCTION. XXill 

trality between the Whigs and the Tories, unless I shall 
be forced to declare myself by the hostilities of either 
side." 

The new paper appeared daily, instead of tri-weekly, 
and each issue consisted of a single essay, in this respect 
resembling the last numbers of The Taller. Isaac Bicker- 
staff was replaced by the Club, as outlined in Nos. 1 and 
2. Throughout, the moral essay (only occasional in The 
Taller) predominates, intermixed with critical and literary 
papers. It is The Speclalor that contains Addison's papers 
upon Paradise Lost, and Chevy Chase ; the essays upon 
Wit, his Vision of Mirza, and his criticisms of the con- 
temporary drama. 

The popularity of The Spectator was immense. Addi- 
son estimates that the first numbers sold at the rate of 
3000. daily, and even after the half-penny tax imposed by 
the Stamp Act made it necessary to double the price of the 
sheet, the reduced circulation was about 10,000 per week. 

The paper made its daily appearance upon the breakfast 
tables of London until December 6, 1712, when it came to 
an end with No. 555. Addison had contributed 274 to 
Steele's 236, and 45 from Budgell, Hughes, and others. 
Just why The Spectator should have ended when it did has 
never been conclusively shown. It is generally supposed 
that Steele's uneasy Interest in politics, an interest which 
he could not express in the neutral pages of The Spectator, 
was the chief cause. In January, 1714, Addison revived 
The Spectator on his own account (the eighth volume), 
but it lived only until December. 



XX iv INTIiODUCriON. 

In the nn^iuitiiiio, Stcolo had I'lnltarkod u|k)ii aiiotluT 
vontun^ March \'2, 17 11), a new visitor iippwiri'd in the 
London coffcH>-hou.scs and drawing-rooms. It was called 
Thv (huirdiiui, from one Mr. Nestor Ironside, who was 
rt'presented as standin*:^ in this rehition to the Lizard 
family. All these characters played their parts, as Mr. 
Bickerstaff and the (Uub had done before them. Like The 
Spccl<Uof\ The Guardian was issueil daily. lUit it had 
little of the vitality or success of its illustrious i)redecessor, 
and lasted only until October of the sanu^ year. Addison, 
who was busy with his ('lUo, contributed nothin<^ until the 
S'ixty-sixth number. On the other hand, towards the end, 
Steele devoted little time to the paj)er, for his political 
activities were crowdinj^ out the literary. Politics, which 
had come to the surface only occasionally in The Ta(lv)\ 
and had been kept completely out of The Spectator, figured 
very prominently in The Guardian. Macaulay says the 
paper "began in dullness, and ended in a tempest of 
faction.'' 



These perit)ilicals iiave a threefold interest for us : 
First, biographical ; second, literary ; third, moral. 

1. In No. 555 of The Spectator, Steele wrote: "I 
remember when I linished The Tender Husband, I told 
him (Addison) there was nothing I so ardently wished as 
that we might some time or other publish a work written 
by us both, whiiOi should bear the name of The Monument, 
in memory of our friendshi[)." Such a Monutnenl is The 



INTRODUirnoN. XXV 

Speelafnr, and a rare ti-i<'inlslii|> «I<)»'S it commcnioralo. 
Th(^s(i two <:;it'l«Ml iiuMi siMmuMl inlcmUMl for co-workors ; 
each was tlu; (•omi)l(Mn(M]t of llu^ otlior in jronius aiul in 
teniporaincMil. Stcsclii's iinpiiIsiviUiCHSs was toniixinul l)y 
A(l(Iison\s nio(l(^ration ; and (!an w(! not fan(;y St(3(d(i lirin«i^ 
tlu^ scHMu; Addison wilh tlni ^low of iiis own cnthnsiasm ? 
The H])<u't<U<)r is not nK^i'dy lil(!ra(ur(\ it is the lif(!-l)loo(l 
of a nol»lo fri<Midshi|). 

2. Historically, tli(^s(» (»ssays hav(^ a places in Kn<»;lish 
litiM-atnn? as I ho fonM'unncr of Hk; realistic novc^l, which 
had its i"is(i in the, next ;!;en(^ration with Ivichardson, Ki(^ld- 
in<z;, and Smollett. Addison and Steidc; (ihose their 
material from llu^ world of m(ni and wonnu) about them, 
and showiMl them in their (Oiaraeteristie and (n'(M\yday 
as|)ft(!t. Then, too, these writ(M*s elios<». to see what odiesrs 
had passed i)y as commonplac(!, Steele, particrularly, in 
ton(!hin<>; upon the life wilhin tln^ hom(\ opened the Wi^'wx 
wiii('h yield(Hl so richly wIkmi workiid by (ioldsmith and 
other novelists of dom(^sli(r life;. 

In (!ontrastin<»' the work of tin; two men, w<! should say 
that Sttude's essays are chara(r((!ri/(Ml by vivacrity, d(q)lh of 
feelinj:;, sometimes a,n excpiisite j)a(hos; vVddison's by tlie 
delicate touch, the happy fancy, tin; cam(H)-lik(? linish. 
Both at their best possess a natural n<;ss and (conversational 
ease that draws from Prof. (Jeor<»;(; 11. Palnnu' the (rhar- 
aclcn'i/al.ion : " The (»ssays of Tlir S/icr/iUor, llw. poems of 
Pope, are the; nnnarks of a cultivatiid <i;(MitleniMii at an 
evenin<;- party.''' 



XXVI INTRODUCTION. 

3. The aim of the essaj's was only partly to entertain; 
it included also a regeneration of manners, morals, and art. 
As Addison expresses it in No. 10 of The Spectator: <' It 
was said of Socrates that he brought Philosophy down from 
heaven to inhabit among men ; and I shall be ambitious to 
have it said of me that I have brought Philosophy out of 
closets and libraries, schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs 
and assemblies, at tea-tables, and in coffee-houses." 

From what has been said of the conditions of the time, 
it will be seen that the work to be accomplished was one of 
reconciliation. The Puritan had tried to make life a psalm 
and a fast; Charles II. turned it into a jest and a carousal. 
These two hostile standards of living still divided society. 
Steele and Addison took their stand on the middle ground 
and forced both extremes to come to them and join hands. 
For instance, the stage against which Jeremy Collier, the 
great non-juring preacher, had thundered his invective to 
some effect, was the target for some of the keenest criticism 
and most effective ridicule in the essays ; at the same time, 
Addison and Steele undertook to show in their own plays 
tliat a drama could be both entertaining and decent. None 
of tlie prevalent vices or follies, such as gaming, duelling, 
drunkenness, escaped their shafts. The ideal that the}^ held 
iTp to men was that of a true gentleman, who could be virtu- 
ous, even religious, without being ascetic; witty without 
being coarse ; wlio enjoyed a thousand pleasures and in- 
dulged to excess in none ; who loved a good book, a good 
play, a good sermon, a good jest, a good companion. 



IN TR OD U C Tl ON. XX vii 

Their teachings did not, of course, sudden!}^ revolutionize 
taste and morals, but it is certainly largely true that since 
their time ' ' the open violation of decency has always been 
considered among us the mark of a fool." 

Steele's ideal of woman was beyond his age. To her, in 
effect, he said : " You are not a butterfly and a puppet. 
You have a soul and an understanding. Do not almse 
them, and remember that you have in your keeping the 
morals of a nation." He aimed to make women respected 
l)y teaching them to respect themselves. In this connection 
let us recall his tribute to one woman, Lady Elizabeth 
Hastings, which has been called the finest tribute ever paid 
to woman : " To love her u a liber'al ahication.'''' 

The essays rcacrhed all classes of society. Those who 
needed the lessons and those who merely approved of the 
teaching devoured The Si^cetator as regularly as their 
breakfast. All the world met in its pages ; it was the one 
spot of common ground, aud this in itself worked towards 
the unifying of society. Best of all, those who read 
hardly knew they were being improved, so much were 
they entertained. The secret of the effectiveness of the 
lesson lies in that and in the fact that the readers saw in 
Addison a man who lived in the world and of it, and yet 
whose life was in harmony with his teachings. 



XX vill INTE OD UC TI ON. 



SIGNATURES TO THE DE COYERLEY PAPERS. 

The papers signed C, L, I, or O are by Addison, who 
chose the letters forming the name of the Muse of History. 
Steele's signature is R or T ; BudgelPs X. 

In this connection, read Spectator No. 221. 



SUGGESTIONS. 

Most teachers who have used the De Coverley Papers 
with classes will agree that the whole difficulty comes in 
arousing the interest of the student. He can easily be 
made to understand, but not so easily to appreciate. In 
these essays there is too little doing and too much think- 
ing to please the youthful fancy fed upon swiftly-moving 
plots and active characters. To give human interest to the 
study it will be found necessary 1) to dwell upon the story 
element, wherever it appears ; 2) to encourage .ne pupils 
to talk about the characters as if they were real, and ^er- 
haps to find counterparts among people we meet ; 3) to 
make the conditions of the time as vivid as possible, 
and let the pupils make comparisons with present con- 
ditions ; 4) to call some attention to the lives and charac- 
ters of the writers ; .5) to set pupils to find the particular 
aim of each paper that has an aim ; 6) to allow them to 
take excursions into other of the The Spectator essays, par- 
ticularly the narrative and humorous papers. For this 



INTRODUCTION. xxix 

purpose, a complete Sjjectator is indispensable. The In- 
troduction to this edition furnishes only a starting-point 
for the various lines of study suggested here. 

It is hoped that the notes may awaken at least some 
curiosity in the student. The use made of them will de- 
pend upon the purpose to Avhich the papers are put. They 
may be studied as literature or they may serve as models 
of style for the young writer. What has been said of the 
effort to stimulate interest applies particularly to their use 
as literature. In the present cliaotic state of the teaching 
of English composition, it may not be out of place to make 
a few suggestions with regard to this branch of the work. 

These suggestions contain nothing new ; they merely 
empliasize old principles, which are in danger of being 
abandoned. We are old-fashioned enough to believe that 
grace at least, that most elusive and most coveted quality 
of style, can be acquired only by forcing upon one's mind 
the style of a writer like Addison who possesses grace in 
a high degree. Accuracy, order, correctness, can be 
learned in other ways and more easily, but that last touch 
which distinguishes the literary work can be acquired, we 
believe, in onh^ one way. We use the word acquired ad- 
visedly, for no one will dispute the fact that great geniuses 
make their own style. The average class in school, how- 
ever, contains few of these creators. The method advo- 
cated is adapted to the pupil of average endowment, and 
yet does not smother or dwarf original genius if it hap- 
pens to be resident in the class. 



XXX IN TR 01) UC ri ON. 

To be more definite as to method, we suggest that the 
old plan of memorizing long passages from writings like 
Addison's is the best way in the world to attune one's ear 
to graceful and harmonious sentences, which one will use 
unconsciously as models when one forms sentences of one's 
own. Reproduction of passages in the student's own 
words and comparison with the original is another method 
which modern pedagogy has not improved upon. Some, 
but not too much, analysis of the arrangement, and devel- 
opment of thought, and consideration of the choice of 
words in tliese passages will aid the student to a grasp of 
all the rhetorical principles he needs. He is in danger 
of being burdened with so many that he comes to think the 
art of composition can be mastered hy merel}^ following a 
certain formula. There is no rule for writing a good 
essay as there is for making a good pudding. 

Of course all the work in composition should not be 
entirely in the line of reproduction. Opportunity must be 
given the student to express his own thoughts upon sub- 
jects he is really interested in. We have found it helpful 
to invent the fiction that the members of the class are con- 
tributors to a paper similar in style and purpose to The 
Siyectator, and to encourage the students to find material 
in the life about them. It is an advantage if there is an 
actual printed paper in which the articles may apjjear and 
be read by part or all of the school. 

If tlie De Coverhy Pajiers are used only as models of 
style, as long a time as possible should be given to them 



IN FRO I) U(J Tl ON. XXXI 

and others selected from The SjKclator. In this case, 
neither notes nor introduction will be needed. With a 
little selection and guidance on the teacher's part, the stu- 
dent will find the text itself sufficient to cultivate in his 
mind the feeling for harmony, rhythm, and proportion. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. 

The more interesting of the many references have been 
selected for this list. 

Addison. 

MoRLEY, Introduction to the Spectator. 

CouRTHopE, Life of Addison {English Men of Letters). 

Macau LAV, Essays. 

Johnson, Works. 

Thackeray, The English Humorists, 

Henry Esmond. 
Taine, The History of English Literature. 
GossE, The History of Eighteenth Century Literature. 
MiNTO, English Prose Literature. 

Steele. 

Besides wliat can be found in the above, the following 
are suggested : 

DoBSON, English Writers. 
TucKERMAN, Biographical Essays. 

Morley's edition of The Spectator is the best complete 
edition. 



SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

{FROM THE SPECTATOR.) 



THE SPECTATOR'S ACCOUNT OF 
HIMSELF. 

No. 1. 

Thursday, March 1, 1710-1711 

Non fumum ex fulgore, sed ex fuino tlaie lucem 
Cogitat, ut speciosa deliiiic miracula promat. 

Hon. Ars J'oet. 143. 

I HAVE observed, that a reader seldom peruses 
a book with pleasure, till he kuows whether tlie 
writer of it be a black or a fair man, of a mild or 
choleric disposition, married or a bachelor, with 
other particulars of the like nature, that conduce 
very much to the right understanding of an author. 

1 



2 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

To gratify this curiosity, which is so natural to a 
reader, I design this paper and my next as pref- 
atory discourses to my following writings, and 
shall give some account in them of the several 

5 persons that are engaged in this work. As the 
chief trouble of compiling, digesting, and cor- 
recting will fall to my share, I must do myself 
the justice to open the work with my own history. 
I was born to a small hereditary estate, which, 

10 according to the tradition of the village where it 
lies, was bounded by the same hedges and ditches 
in William the Conquerors time that it is at 
present, and has been delivered down from father 
to son whole and entire, without the loss or acqui- 

15 sition of a single field or meadow, during the 
space of six hundred years. There runs a story 
in the family, that my mother dreamt that she 
was brought to bed of a judge : whether this 
might proceed from a law-suit which was then 

20 depending in the family, or jny father s being a 
justice of the peace, I cannot determine ; for I am 
not so vain as to think it presaged any dignity 
that I should arrive at in my future life, though 
that was the interpretation which the neighbor- 



TEE SPECTATOirS ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF. 3 

hood put upon it. The gravity of my behavior 
at my very first appearance in the world seemed 
to favor my mother's dream ; for, as she has 
often told me, I threw away my rattle before I 
was two months old, and would not make use 5 
of my coral till they had taken away the bells 
from it. 

As for the rest of my infancy, there being 
nothing in it remarkable, I shall pass it over in 
silence. I find, that during my nonage, I had the lO 
reputation of a very sullen youth, but was always 
a favorite of my schoolmaster, who used to say, 
that my parts were solid, and would wear well. 
I had not been long at the university, before I 
distinguished myself by a most profound silence : 15 
for during the space of eight years, excepting in 
the public exercises of the college, I scarce uttered 
tlie quantity of an hundred words; and indeed do 
not remember that I ever spoke three sentences 
together in my whole life. Whilst I was in this 20 
learned body, I applied myself with so much dili- 
gence to my studies, that there are very few 
celebrated books, either in the learned or modern 
tongues, which I am not acquainted with. 



4 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

Upon the death of my father, 1 was resolved to 
travel into foreign countries, and therefore left 
the university with the character of an odd, unac- 
countable fellow, that had a great deal of learning, 

5 if I Avould but show it. An insatiable thirst after 
knowledge carried me into all the countries of 
Europe in which there was any thing new or 
strange to be seen : nay, to such a degree was mj^ 
curiosity raised, that having read the controversies 

10 of some great men concerning the antiquities of 
Egypt, I made a voyage to Grand Cairo, on pur- 
pose to take the measure of a pyramid ; and as 
soon as 1 had set myself right in that particu- 
lar, returned to my native country with great 

15 satisfaction. 

I have passed my latter years in this city, where 
1 am frequently seen in most public places, though 
there are not above half a dozen of my select 
friends that know me ; of whom my next paper 

20 shall give a more particular account. There is no 
place of general resort, wherein I do not often 
make my appearance ; sometimes I am seen thrust- 
ing my head into a round of politicians at Will's, 
and listening with great attention to the narra- 



THE SPECTATOR'^ ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF. 5 

tives tliat are made in those little circular audi- 
ences. Sometimes I smoke a pipe at Child's, and 
whilst I seem attentive to nothing but The Post- 
man, overhear the conversation of every table in 
the room. I appear on Sunday niglits at St. 5 
James's Coffee-house, and sometimes join the little 
committee of politics in the inner room, as one 
who comes there to liear and improve. Mj face 
is likewise very well known at the Grecian, the 
Cocoa Tree, and in the Theatres both of Drury- lo 
Lane and the Hay-Market. 1 have been taken for 
a merchant upon the Exchange for above these 
ten years, and sometimes pass for a Jew in the 
assembly of stockjobbers at Jonathan's : in short, 
wherever I see a cluster of people, I always mix 16 
with them, though I never open my lips but in 
my own club. 

Thus I live in the world rather as a Spectator 
of mankind than as one of the species ; by which 
means I have made myself a speculative states- 20 
man, soldier, merchant, and artisan, without ever 
meddling with any practical part in life. I am 
very well versed in the theory of an husband or 
a father, and can discern the errors in the econ- 



b SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

omy, business, and diversion of others, better than 
those who are engaged in them ; as standers-by 
discover blots, which are apt to escape those who 
are in the game. I never espoused any party with 

5 violence, and am resolved to observe an exact neu- 
trality between the Whigs and Tories, unless I 
shall be forced to declare myself by the hostilities 
of either side. In short, I have acted in all the 
pai'ts of my life as a looker-on, which is the char- 

10 acter I intend to preserve in this paper. 

I have given the reader just so much of my 
history and character, as to let him see I am not 
altogether unqualified for the business I have 
undertaken. As for other particulars in my life 

15 and adventures, I shall insert them in following 
papers, as I shall see occasion. In the mean time, 
when I consider how much I have seen, read, and 
heard, I begin to blame my own taciturnity ; and 
since I have neither time nor inclination to com- 

20 municate the fulness of my heart in speech, I am 
resolved to do it in writing, and to print myself 
out, if possible, before I die. I have been often 
told by my friends that it is pity so many use- 
ful discoveries which I have made should be in 



THE SPECTATOR'S ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF. 7 

the possession of a silent man. For this reason, 
therefore, 1 shall publish a sheet-full of thoughts 
every morning for the benefit of my contenjpora- 
ries ; and if I can in any way contribute to the 
diversion or improvement of the country in which 5 
I live, I shall leave it, when I am summoned 
out of it, with the secret satisfaction of thinking 
that I have not lived in vain. 

There are three very material points which I 
have not spoken to in this paper, and which, for lo 
several important reasons, I must keep to myself, 
at least for some time : I mean an account of my 
name, my age, and my lodgings. I must confess, 
I would gratify my reader in anything that is rea- 
sonable ; but as for these three particulars, though 15 
1 am sensible they might tend very much to the 
embellishment of my paper, I cannot yet come to 
a resolution of communicating them to the pul)lic. 
They would indeed draw me out of that obscurity 
which I have enjoyed for many years, and expose 20 
me in public places to several salutes and civili- 
ties, which have been always very disagreeable to 
me ; for the greatest pain I can suffer, is the being 
talked to and being stared at. It is for this rea- 



8 STR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

son likewise, that I keep my complexion and dress 
as very great secrets ; though it is not impossible, 
but I may make discoveries of both in the progress 
of the work I have undertaken. 

5 After having been thus particular upon myself, 
1 shall in to-morrow's paper give an account of 
those gentlemen who are concerned with me in 
this work; for, as I have before intimated, a plan 
of it is laid and concerted (as all other matters of 

10 importance are) in a club. However, as my 
friends Jiave engaged me to stand in the front, 
those who have a mind to correspond with me 
may direct their letters to the Spectator, at 
Mr. Buckley's, in Little Britain. For I must 

15 further acquaint the reader, that though our club 
meets only on Tuesdays and Thursdays, we have 
appointed a Committee to sit every night for the 
inspection of all such papers as may contribute 
to the advancement of the public weal. C. 



THE CLUB. 



THE CLUB. 

No. 2. 



FuiDAv, March 2, 1710-1711. 



Ast alii sex 



Et plures uiio coiiclaniant ore. 

Juv. Sat. vii. 1G7. 

The first of our society is a gentleman of 
Worcestersliire, of ancient descent, a baronet, his 
name Sir Roger de Coverley. His great grandfather 
was inventor of that famous country-dance wliich 
is called after him. All who know that shire are 5 
very well acquainted with the parts and merits of 
Sir Roger. He is a gentleman that is very singu- 
lar in his behavior, but his singularities proceed 
from his good sense, and are contradictions to the 
manners of the world, only as he tliinks the world 10 
is in the wrong. However, this humor creates 
him no enemies, ft)r he does nothing with sourness 



10 sin ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

or obstinacy ; and his being nnconfined to modes 
and forms, makes him but the readier and more 
capable to please and oblige all who know him. 
When he is in town, he lives in Soho square. It 

5 is said, he keeps himself a bachelor by reason he 
was crossed in love by a perverse beautiful widow 
of the next county to him. Before this disappoint- 
ment. Sir Roger was what you call a fine gentle- 
man, had often supped with my Lord Rochester 

10 and Sir George Etherege, fought a duel upon his 
first coming to town, and kicked Bully Dawson 
in a public coffee-house for calling him youngster. 
But being ill used by the above-mentioned widow, 
he was very serious for a year and a half ; and 

15 though, his temper being naturally jovial, he at 
last got over it, he grew careless of himself, and 
never dressed afterwards. He continues to wear 
a coat and doublet of the same cut that were in 
fashion at the time of his repulse, which, in his 

20 merry humors, he tells us, has been in and out 
twelve times since he first wore it. He is now in 
his fifty-sixth 3^ear, cheerful, gay, and hearty ; 
keeps a good house in botli town and country ; a 
great lover of mankind ; but there is such a mirth- 



THE CLUB. 11 

fill cast in his beliavior, that he is rather beloved 
than esteemed : his tenants grow rich, his servants 
look satisfied ; all the young women profess love 
to him, and the young men are glad of his com- 
pany: when he comes into a house, he calls the 5 
servants by their names, and talks all the way up 
stairs to a visit. I must not omit that Sir Roger 
is a justice of the quorum ; that he fills the chair 
at a quarter-session with great abilities, and three 
months ago gained universal applause by explain- 10 
ing a passage in the game act. 

The gentleman next in esteem and authority 
among us is another bachelor, who is a mendjer 
of the Inner Temple ; a man of great probity, wit, 
and understanding; but he has chosen his place 15 
of residence rather to obey the direction of an old 
humorsome father, than in pursuit of his own 
inclinations. He was placed there to study the 
laws of the land, and is the most learned of any 
of the house in those of the stage. Aristotle and 20 
Longinus are much better understood by him than 
Littleton or Coke. The father sends up every 
post questions relating to marriage-articles, leases, 
and tenures, in tlie neighboi-hood ; all which 



12 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

questions he agrees with an attorney to answer 
and take care of in the lump. He is studying the 
passions themselves, when he should be inquiring 
into the debates among men which arise from 

5 them. He knows the argument of each of the 
orations of Demosthenes and TuUy, but not one 
case in the reports of our own courts. No one 
ever took him for a fool ; but none, except his 
intimate friends, know he has a great deal of wit. 

10 This turn makes him at once both disinterested 
and agreeable ; as few of his thoughts are drawn 
from business, they are most of them fit for con- 
versation. His taste of books is a little too just 
for tlie age he lives in ; he has read all, but ap- 

15 proves of very few. His familiarity with the cus- 
toms, manners, actions, and writings of the 
ancients, makes him a very delicate observer of 
what occurs to him in the present world. He is 
an excellent critic, and the time of the play is 

20 his hour of business ; exactly at five he passes 
through New Inn, crosses through Russel Court, 
and takes a turn at Will's till the play begins : 
he has his shoes rubbed and his periwig pow- 
dered at the barber's as you go into the Rose. 



THE CLUB. 13 

It is for the good of the aiulience when he is 
at a play, for the actors liave an ambition to 
please him. 

The person of next consideration, is Sir Andrew 
Freeport, a merchant of great eminence in the 5 
city of London ; a person of indefatigable in- 
dustry, strong reason, and great experience. His 
notions of trade are noble and generous, and (as 
every rich man has usually some sly way of jest- 
ing, which would make no great figure were he 10 
not a rich man) he calls the sea the British Com- 
mon. He is acquainted with commerce in all its 
parts, and will tell you that it is a stupid and 
barbarous way to extend dominion by arms ; for 
true power is to be got by arts and industry. He 15 
will often argue, that if this part of our trade 
were well cultivated, we should gain from one 
nation ; and if another, from another. I have 
heard him prove that diligence makes more last- 
ing acquisitions than valor, and that sloth has 20 
ruined more nations than the sword. He abounds 
in several frugal maxims, amongst which the greats 
est favorite is, " A penny saved is a penny got." 
A general trader of good sense is pleasanter com- 



14 SIR ROGER 1)E COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

pany than a general scholar ; and Sir Andrew 
having a natural unaffected eloquence, the per- 
s]3icuity of his discourse gives the same pleasure 
that wit would in another man. He has made 

5 his fortunes himself ; and says that England may 
be richer than other kingdoms by as plain methods 
as he himself is richer than other men ; thougli at 
the same time I can say this of him, that there is 
not a point in tlie compass but blows home a slii[) 

10 in which he is an owner. 

Next to Sir Andrew in the club-room sits 
Captain Sentry, a gentleman of great courage, 
good understanding, but invincible modest}^ He 
is one of those that deserve very well, but are 

15 very awkward at putting their talents within the 
observation of such as should take notice of them. 
He was some years a captain, and behaved himself 
with great gallantry in several engagements and 
at several sieges ; but having a small estate of 

20 his own, and being next heir to Sir Roger, he has 
quitted a way of life in which no man can rise 
suitably to his merit, who is not something of a 
courtier as well as a soldier. I have heard him 
often lament that in a profession where merit is 



THE CLUB. 15 

placed in so conspicuous a view, impudence should 
get the better of modesty. When he has talked 
to this purpose, I never heard him make a sour 
expression, but frankly confess that he left the 
world, because he was not fit for it. A strict 5 
honesty and an even regular behavior are in 
themselves obstacles to him that must press 
through crowds, who endeavor at the same end 
with himself, the favor of a commander. He will, 
however, in this way of talk, excuse generals for lo 
not disposing according to men's desert, or inquir- 
ing into it : for, says he, that great man who has 
a mind to help me, has as many to break through 
to come at me, as I have to come at him : therefore 
he will conclude, that the man who would make a 15 
figure, especially in a military way, must get over 
all false modesty, and assist his patron against the 
importunity of other pretenders, by a proper as- 
surance in his own vindication. He says it is a 
civil cowardice to be backward in asserting what 20 
you ought to expect, as it is a military fear to be 
shjw in attacking wlien it is your duty. With 
this candor does the gentleman speak of himself 
and others. The same frankness runs through all 



16 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

his conversation. The military part of his life 
has furnished him with man}^ adventures, in the 
relation of which he is very agreeable to the 
company; for he is never overbearing, though 

5 accustomed to command men in the utmost 
degree below him ; nor ever too obsequious, 
from an habit of obeying men highly above 
him. 

But that our society may not appear a set of 

10 humorists unacquainted with the gallantries and 
pleasures of the age, we have among us the gal- 
lant Will Honeycomb, a gentleman who, accord- 
ing to his years, should be in the decline of his 
life, but having ever been very careful of his per- 

15 son, and always had a very easy fortune, time has 
made but very little impression, either by wrinkles 
on his forehead, or traces in his brain. His per- 
son is well turned, of a good height. He is very 
ready at that sort of discourse with which men 

20 usually entertain women. He has all his life 
dressed very well, and remembers habits as others 
do men. He can smile when one speaks to him, 
and laughs easily. He knows the history of every 
mode, and can inform you from wliich of the 



THE CLUB. 17 

French king s wenches our wives and daughters 
had this manner of curUng their hair, that way of 
placing their hoods ; whose frailty was covered by 
such a sort of petticoat, and whose vanity to show 
her foot made that part of the dress so short in 5 
such a year : in a word, all his conversation and 
knowledge has been in the female world. As 
other men of his age will take notice to you what 
such a minister said upon such and such an occa- 
sion, he will tell you when the Duke of Mon- 10 
mouth danced at court, such a woman was then 
smitten, another was taken with him at the head 
of his troop in the park. In all these important 
relations, he has ever about the same time received 
a kind glance or a blow of a fan from some 15 
celebrated beauty, mother of the present Lord 
Such-a-one. If you speak of a young commoner 
that said a lively thing in the House, he starts up, 
" He has good blood in his veins : Tom Mirabel 
begot him : the rogue cheated me in that affair : 20 
that young fellow's mother used me more like a 
dog than any woman I ever made advances to." 
This way of talking of his very much enlivens the 
conversation among us of a more sedate turn ; and 



18 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS, 

I find there is not one of the company, but my- 
self, who rarely speak at all, but speaks of him as 
of that sort of man who is usually called a well- 
bred line gentleman. To conclude his character, 

5 where women are not concerned, he is anlionest 
worthy man. 

I cannot tell whether I am to account him 
whom I am next to speak of, as one of our com- 
pany, for he visits us but seldom ; but when he 

10 does, it adds to every man else a new enjoyment 
of himself. He is a clergyman, a very philosophic 
man, of general learning, great sanctity of life, and 
the most exact breeding. He has the misfortune 
to be of a very weak constitution, and conse- 

15 quently cannot accept of such cares and business 
as preferments in his function would oblige him 
to : he is therefore, among divines, what a cham- 
ber-counsellor is among lawyers. The probity of 
his mind and the integrity of his life, create him 

20 followers, as being eloquent or loud advances 
others. He seldom introduces the subject he 
speaks upon : but we are so far gone in years, that 
he observes when he is among us an earnestness 
to have him fall on some divine topic, which he 



THE CLUB. 19 

always treats with much authority, as one who 
has no interests in this world, as one who is 
hastening to the object of all his wishes, and con- 
ceives hope from his decays and infirmities. 
These are my ordinary companions. R. 



20 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



SIR ROGER AND THE SPECTATOR 
UPON MANNERS. 

No. 6. 

Wednesday, March 7, 1710-1711. 

Credebaiit hoc graiide nefas, et morte piaudum, 

Si juvenis vetulo non assurrexerat . 

Juv. Sat. xiii. 54. 

I KNOW no evil under the sun so great as the 
abuse of the understanding, and yet there is no 
one vice more common. It has diffused itself 
through both sexes and all qualities of mankind ; 

5 and there is hardly that person to be found who 
is not more concerned for the reputation of wit 
and sense, than honesty and virtue. But this 
unhappy affectation of being wise rather than 
honest, witty than good-natured, is the source of 

10 most of the ill habits of life. Such false impres- 
sions are owing to the abandoned writings of men 
of wit, and the awkward imitation of the rest of 
mankind. 



THE SPECTATOR UPO.V MANNERS. 21 

For this reason, Sir Roger was saying last 
night that he was of opinion tliat none but men 
of fine parts deserve to be hanged. The re- 
flections of such men are so delicate upon all 
occurrences which they are concerned in, that 5 
they should be exposed to more than ordinary 
infamy and punishment, for offending against such 
quick admonitions as their own souls give them, 
and blunting the fine edge of their minds in such 
a manner, that they are no more shocked at vice 10 
and folly, than men of slower capacities. There 
is no greater monster in being, than a very ill 
man of great parts : he lives like a man in a palsy, 
with one side of him dead. While perhaps he 
enjoys the satisfaction of luxury, of wealth, of 15 
ambition, he has lost the taste of good-will, of 
friendship, of innocence. Scarecrow, the beggar 
in Lincoln's Inn Fields, who disabled himself in 
his right leg, and asks alms all day to get himself 
a warm supper at night, is not half' so despicable 20 
a wretch as such a man of sense. The beggar 
has no relish above sensations ; he finds rest more 
agreeable than motion ; and while he has a warm 
fire, never reflects that he deserves to be whipped. 



22 Slil nOGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

Every man who terminates his satisfaction and 
enjoyments within tlie supply of his own neces- 
sities and passions, is, says Sir Roger, in my eye 
as poor a rogue as Scarecrow. " But," continued 

5 he, " for the loss of public and private virtue we 
are beholden to your men of parts forsooth ; it is 
with them no matter what is done, so it is done 
with an air. But to me who am so whimsical in 
a corrupt age as to act according to nature and 

10 reason, a selfish man in the most shining circum- 
stance and equipage appears in the same condi- 
tion with the fellow above-mentioned, but more 
contemptible in proportion to what more he robs 
the public of and enjoys above him. I lay it 

15 down, therefore, for a rule, that the whole man is 
to move together; that every action of any im- 
portance is to have a prospect of public good; 
and that the general tendency of our indifferent 
actions ought to be agreeable to the dictates of 

20 reason, of religion, of good breeding ; without 
this, a man, as 1 have before hinted, is hopping 
instead of walking, he is not in his entire and 
proper motion." 

While the honest knicrht was thus bewildering 



THE SPECTATOn UPON MANNERS. 23 

himself in good starts, 1 looked intentively upon 
him, which made him, 1 thought, collect his mind 
a little. " Wlutt I aim at," says he, " is to 
represent that 1 am of opinion, to polish our 
understandings and neglect our manners is, of all 5 
things, the most inexcusable. Reason should, 
govern passion, but instead of that, you see, it is 
often subservient to it ; and, as unaccountable as 
one would think it, a wise man is not always a 
good man." This degeneracy is not only the 10 
gnilt of particular persons, but also, at some 
times, of a whole people ; and perhaps it may 
appear upon examination that the most polite 
ages are the least virtuous. This may be attrib- 
uted to the folly of admitting wit and learning 15 
as merit in themselves, without considering the 
application of them. By this means it becomes a 
rule not so much to regard what we do, as how 
we do it. But this false beauty will not pass 
upon men of honest minds and true taste. Sir 20 
Richard Blackmore says, with as much good 
sense as virtue, "It is a mighty dishonor and 
shame to employ excellent faculties and abun- 
dance of wit to humor and please men in their 



24 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

vices and follies. The great enemy of mankind, 
notwithstanding his wit and angelic faculties, is 
the most odious being in the whole creation." 
He goes on soon after to say very generously, 

5 that he undertook the writing of his poem, " to 
rescue the muses out of the hands of the ravishers, 
to restore them to their sweet and chaste mansions, 
and to engage them in an employment suitable to 
their dignity." This certainly ought to be the 

10 purpose of every man who appeal's in public ; 
and whoever does not proceed upon that founda- 
tion, injures his country as fast as he succeeds in 
liis studies. When modesty ceases to be the 
chief ornament of one sex, and integrity of the 

15 other, society is upon a wrong basis, and we 
shall be ever after without rules to guide our 
judgment in what is really becoming and orna- 
mental. Nature and reason direct one thing, 
passion and immor another : to follow the dictates 

20 of tlic two latter is going into a road tliat is both 
endless and intricate ; when we pursue the other 
our passage is delightful, and what we aim at 
easily attainable. 

I do not doul)t that England is at present as 



THE ^SPECTATOR UPON MANNERS. 25 

polite a nation as any in the world ; bnt any man 
who thinks can easily see, that tlie affectation of 
being guy and in fashion has very near eaten up 
our good sense and our religion. Is tliere any- 
thing so just, as that mode and gallantry should 5 
be built upon exerting ourselves in what is proper 
and agreeable to the institutions of justice and 
piety among us ? And yet is there anything more 
common, tlian that we run in perfect contradiction 
to them? All which is supported by no other lo 
pretension, than that it is done with what we call 
a good grace. 

Nothing ought to be held laudable or becoming 
but what nature, itself, should prompt us to think 
so. Respect to all kind of superiors is founded, 15 
methinks, upon instinct ; and yet what is so ridic- 
ulous as age ? I make this abrupt transition to 
the mention of this vice more than 'any other, in 
order to introduce a little story, which I think a 
pretty instance that the most polite age is in 20 
danger of being the most vicious. 

"It happened at Athens, during a public repre- 
sentation of some play exhibited in honor of the 
conunon wealth that an old gentleman came too 



26 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

late for a place suitable to his age and quality. 
Many of the young gentlemen who observed the 
difficulty and confusion he was in, made signs to 
him that they would accommodate him if he came 

5 where they sat. The good man bustled through 
the crowd accordingly ; but when he came to the 
seats to which he was invited, the jest was to sit 
close, and expose him, as he stood out of counte- 
nance, to the whole audience. The frolic went 

10 round all the Athenian benches. But on those 
occasions there were also particular places assigned 
for foreigners. When the good man skulked 
toward the boxes appointed for the Lacede- 
monians, that honest people, more virtuous than 

15 polite, rose u^) all to a man, and with the greatest 
respect received him among them. The Athenians 
being suddenly touched with a sense of the Spartan 
virtue and their own degeneracy, gave a thunder 
of applause ; and the old man cried out, ' The 

20 Athenians understand what is good, but the Lace- 
demonians practise it.' " R. 



THE SPECTATOR AND THE CLUB. 



THE SPECTATOR AND THE CLUB. 

No. 34. 

Monday, A'pril 0, 1711. 



])arcit 

Cognatis maciilis siiuilis tora 

Jnv. Sat. ir>9. 

The clnl) of which I am a iiiemher is very 
luckily composed of such persons as are engaged 
ill different ways of life, and deputed, as it were, 
out of the most conspicuous classes of mankind : 
by this means I am furnished with the greatest 5 
variety of hints and materials, and know every 
thing that passes in the different quarters and 
divisions, not only of this great city, but of the 
whole kingdom. My readers, too, have the satis- 
faction to find that there is no rank or degree 10 
among them who have not their representative in 
tliis clul), and that there is always somebody pres- 
ent who will take care of their respective interests, 



28 SIR ROGER DE COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

that nothing may be written or published to the 
prejudice or infringement of their just rights and 
privileges. 

I last night sat very late in company with this 

5 select body of friends, who entertained me with 
several remarks which they and others had made 
upon these my speculations, as also with the vari- 
ous success which they had met with among their 
several ranks and degrees of readers. Will Honey- 

10 comb told me, in the softest manner he could, that 
there were some ladies (but for your comfort, says 
Will, they are not those of the most wit) that 
were offended at the liberties I had taken with the 
opera and the puppet-show ; that some of them 

15 were likewise very much surprised that I should 
think such serious points as the dress and equipage 
of persons of quality, proper subjects for raillery. 
I He was going on, when Sir Andrew Freeport 
took him up short, and told him that the papers 

20 he hinted at had done great good in the city, and 
that all their wives and daughters were the better 
for them : and further added that the whole city 
thought themselves very much obHged to me for 
declaring my generous intentions to scourge vice 



THE SPECTATOR AND THE CLUB 29 

and folly as they appear in a multitude, without 
condescending to be a publisher of particular 
intrigues. " In short," says Sir Andrew, " if you 
avoid that foolish beaten road of falling upon 
aldermen and citizens, and employ your pen upon 5 
the vanity and luxury of courts, your paper must 
needs be of general use." 

Upon this my friend the Templar told Sir An- 
drew that he wondered to hear a man of his sense 
talk after that manner ; that the city had always 10 
been the province for satire ; and that the wits of 
King Charles's time jested upon nothing else during 
his whole reign. He then showed, by the exam- 
ples of Horace, Juvenal, Boileau, and the best 
writers of every age, that the follies of the stage 15 
and court had never been accounted too sacred for 
ridicule, how great soever the persons might be 
that patronized them. " But after all," says he, 
" I think your raillery has made too great an 
excursion, in attacking several persons of the inns 20 
of court ; and I do not believe you can show me 
any precedent for your behavior in that par- 
ticular." 

My good friend Sir Roger de Coverley, who had 



oO SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

said nothing all this while, began his speech with 
a pish ! and told us that he wondered to see so 
many men of sense so very serious upon fooleries. 
" Let our good friend," said he, '* attack every 

5 one that deserves it: 1 would only advise you, 
Mr. Spectator," applying himself to me, " to take 
care how you meddle with country squires : they 
are the ornaments of the English nation ; men of 
good heads and sound bodies ! and let me tell you, 

10 some of them take it ill of you, that you mention 
fox-hunters with so little respect." 

Captain Sentry spoke very sparingly on this oc- 
casion. What he said was only to commend my pru- 
dence in not touching upon the army, and advised 

15 me to continue to act discreetly in that point. 

By this time I found every subject of my spec- 
ulations was taken away from me, by one or other 
of the club ; and began to think myself in the con- 
dition of the good man that had one wife who took 

20 a dislike to his gray hairs, and another to his 
black, till by their picking out what each of them 
had an aversion to, they left his head altogether 
bald and naked. 

While I was thus musing with myself, my 



THE SPECTATOR AND THE CLUB. 31 

worthy friend the clergyman, who, very luckily for 
me, was at the club that night, undertook my 
cause. He told us that he wondered any order of 
persons should think themselves too considerable 
to be advised : that it was not quality, but inno- 5 
cence, which exempted men from reproof: that 
vice and folly ought to be attacked wherever they 
could be met with, and especially when they were 
placed in high and conspicuous stations of life. 
He further added that my paper would only serve 10 
to aggravate the pains of poverty, if it chiefly 
exposed those who are already depressed, and in 
some measure turned into ridicule, by the mean- 
ness of their conditions and circumstances. He 
afterwards proceeded to take notice of the great 15 
use this paper might be to the public, by repre- 
hending those vices which are too trivial for the 
chastisement of the law, and too fantastical for the 
cognizance of the pulpit. He then advised me to 
prosecute my undertaking with cheerfulness, and 20 
assured me, that whoever might be displeased 
with me, I should be approved by all those whose 
praises do honor to the persons on whom they 
are bestowed. 



82 >S/;^ ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

The whole club pa3^s a particular deference to 
the discourse of this gentleman, and are drawn 
into what he says, as much by the candid and 
ingenuous manner with which he delivers himself, 

6 as by the strength of argument and force of 
reason which he makes use of. Will Honeycomb 
immediately agreed that what he had said was 
right ; and that for his part, he would not insist 
upon the quarter which he had demanded for the 

10 ladies. Sir Andrew gave up the city with the 
same frankness. The Templar would not stand 
out, and was followed by Sir Roger and the Cap- 
tain, who all agreed that I sliould be at liberty to 
carry the war into what quarter I pleased, provided 

15 I continued to combat Avith criminals in a body, 

and to assault the vice without Inirting the person. 

This debate, which was held for the good of 

mankind, put me in mind of that which the Roman 

triumvirate were formerly engaged in, for their 

20 destruction. Every man at first stood hard for his 
friend, till they found that by this means they 
should spoil their proscription : and at length, 
making a sacrifice of all their acquaintance and 
relations, furnished out a very decent execution. 



THE SPEC TA TO II AND THE CLUB. 33 

Having thus taken my resolutions to march on 
boldly in the cause of virtue and good sense, and 
to annoy their adversaries in whatever degree or 
rank of men they may be found, I shall be deaf 
for the future to all the remonstrances that shall 5 
be made to me on this account. If Punch grows 
extravagant, I shall reprimand him very freely : 
if the stage becomes a nursery of folly and imper- 
tinence, I sliall not be afraid to animadvert upon 
it. In short, if I meet with any thing in city, 10 
court, or country, that shocks modesty or good 
manners, I shall use my utmost endeavors to 
make an example of it. I must, however, entreat 
every particular person who does me the honor 
to be a reader of this paper, never to thilik him- 15 
self, or any one of his friends or enemies, aimed at 
in what is said : for I promise him never to draw 
a faulty character which does not fit at least a 
thousand people ; or to publish a single paper that 
is not written in the spirit of benevolence, and 20 
with a love to mankind. C. 



34 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



LEONORA'S LIBRARY. 

No. 37. 

Thursday, April 12, 1711. 

Non ilia colo calathisve Minervae 

Foemineas assueta mauus 

ViBG. Mn. vii. 805. 

Some months ago, my friend Sir Roger, being 
in the country, enclosed a letter to me, directed to 
a certain lady whom I shall here call by the name 
of Leonora, and, as it contained matters of conse- 

5 quence, desired me to deliver it to her with my own 
hand. Accordingly I waited upon her ladyship 
pretty early in the morning, and was desired by 
her woman to walk into her lady's library, till such 
time as she was in a readiness to receive me. The 

10 very sound of a Lady's Library gave me a great 
curiosity to see it ; and, as it was some time before 
the lady came to me, I had an opportunity of 
turning over a great many of her books, which 



LEONORA'S LIBRARY. 35 

were ranged togetlier in a very beautiful order. 
At the end of the folios (which were finely bound 
and gilt) were great jars of China placed one above 
another in a very noble piece of architecture. The 
quartos were separated from the octavos by a pile 5 
of smaller vessels, which rose in a delightful 
pyramid. The octavos were bounded by tea-dishes 
of all shapes, colors, and sizes, which were so dis- 
posed on a wooden frame, that they looked like one 
continued pillar indented with the finest strokes 10 
of sculpture, and stained with the greatest variety 
of dyes. That part of the library which was 
designed for the reception of plays and pamphlets, 
and other loose papers, was enclosed in a kind of 
square, consisting of one of the prettiest grotesque 15 
works that ever I saw, and made up of scara- 
mouches, lions, monkeys, mandarines, trees, shells, 
and a thousand other odd figures in China ware. 
In the midst of the room was a little Japan table, 
with a quire of gilt paper upon it, and on the 20 
paper a silver snuff-box made in the shape of a 
little book. I found there were several other 
counterfeit books upon the upper shelves, which 
were carved in wood, and served only to fill up the 



36 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

numbers, like fagots in the muster of a regiment. 
I was wonderfully pleased with such a mixed kind 
of furniture, as seemed very suitable to both the 
lady and the scholar, and did not know at first 

5 whether I should fancy myself in a grotto or in a 
library. 

Upon my looking into the books, I found there 
were some few which the lady had bought for her 
own use, but that most of them had been got 

10 together, either because she had heard them 
praised, or because she had seen the authors of 
them. Among several that I examined, I very 
well remember these that follow : 

Ogilby's Virgil. 
15 Dryden's Juvenal. 

Cassandra. 

Cleopatra. 

Astraea. 

Sir Isaac Newton's Works. 
20 The Grand Cyrus : with a pin stuck in one of the middle 
leaves. 

Pembroke's Arcadia. 

Locke on Human Understanding : with a paper of jDatches 
in it. 
25 A Spelling-book. 

A Dictionary for the Explanation of Hard Words. 



LEONORA'S LIBRARY. 37 

Sherlock upon Death. 

The Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony. 

Sir William Temple's Essays. 

Father Malebranche's Search after Truth, translated 

into English. 5 

A Boolv of Novels. 
The Academy of Compliments. 
The Ladies' Calling. 
Tales in Verse by Mr. DTIrfey : Bound in red leather, gilt 

on the back, and doubled down in several places. 10 
All the Classic authors in wood. 
A Set of Elzevirs by the same hand. 
Clelia : which opened of itself in the place that describes 

two lovers in a bower. 
Baker's Chronicle. 15 

Advice to a Daughter. 
The New Atalantis, with a key to it. 
Mr. Steele's Christian Hero. 
A Prayer-book : with a bottle of Hungary water by the 

side of it. 20 

Dr. Sachevereirs Speech. 
Fielding's Trial. 
Seneca's Morals. 
Taylor's Holy Living and Dying. 
La Ferte's Instructions for Country Dances. 25 

I was taking a catalogue in my pocket-book of 
these and several other authors, when Leonora 
entered, and, upon my presenting her with the 



38 SIR ROGER BE COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

letter from the Knight, told me, with an unspeak- 
able grace, that she hoped Sir Roger was in good 
health. I answered i/es ; for I hate long speeclies, 
and after a bow or two retired. 

5 Leonora was formerly a celebrated beauty, and 
is still a very lovely woman. She has been a 
widow for two Or three years, and being unfor- 
tunate in her first marriage, has taken a resolution 
never to venture upon a second. She has no 

10 children to take care of, and leaves the manage- 
ment of her estate to my good friend Sir Roger. 
But as the mind naturally sinks into a kind of 
lethargy and falls asleep, that is not agitated by 
some favorite pleasures and pursuits, Leonora has 

15 turned all the passions of her sex into a love of 
books and retirement. She converses chiefly with 
men (as she has often said herself), but it is only 
in their writings ; and admits of very few male 
visitants, except my friend Sir Roger, whom she 

•20 hears with great pleasure, and without scandal. 
As her reading has lain very much among romances, 
it has given her a very particular turn of thinking 
and discovers itself even in her house, her gardens 
and her furniture. Sir Roger has entertained me 



LEONORA'S LIBRARY. 39 

an hour together with a description of her country- 
seat, which is situated in a kind of wilderness, 
about an hundred miles distant from London, and 
looks like a little enchanted palace. The rocks 
about her are shaped into artificial grottoes, covered 5 
with woodbines and jessamines. The woods are 
cut into shady walks, twisted into bowers, and 
filled with cages of turtles. The springs are made 
to run among pebbles, and by that means taught to 
murmur very agreeably. They are likewise col- lO 
lected into a beautiful lake, that is inhabited by 
a couple of swans, and empties itself by a little 
rivulet which runs through a green meadow, and 
is known in the family by the name of The 
Purling Stream. The Knight Hkewise tells me 15 
that this lady preserves her game better than any 
of the gentlemen in the country. " Not," says 
Sir Roger, " that she sets so great a value upon 
her partridges and pheasants, as upon her larks 
and nightingales. For she says that every bird 20 
which is killed in her ground will spoil a concert, 
and that she shall certainly miss him the next 
year." 

When I think how oddly this lady is improved 



40 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

by learning, I look upon her with a mixture of ad- 
miration and pity. Amidst these innocent enter- 
tainments Avhich she has formed to herself, how 
much more valuable does she appear than those of 

5 her sex who employ themselves in diversions that 
are less reasonable, though more in fashion ! What 
improvements would a woman have made who is 
so susceptible of impressions from what she reads, 
had she been guided to such books as have a 

10 tendency to enlighten the understanding and 
rectify the passions, as well as to those which are 
of little more use that to divert the imagination ! 

But the manner of a lady's employing herself 
usefully in reading shall be the subject of another 

15 paper, in which I design to recommend such par- 
ticular books as may be proper for the improve- 
ment of the sex. And as this is a subject of ii 
very nice nature, I shall desire my correspondents 
to give me their thoughts upon it. C. 



TB.K Sl'ECTATOR AND FOtiTERlTY. 41 



THE SPECTATOR AND POSTERITY. 

No. 101. 

Tuesday, June 26, 1711. 

Romulus, et Liber pater, et cum Castore Pollux, 
Post ingeiitia, facta, deoi'um in templa recepti ; 
Dum terras hominumque colunt genus, aspera bella 
CompoDunt, agros assignant, oppida condunt • 
Ploravere sui.s non respondere favorem 

Speratum meritis : 

HOR. 2. Ep. 1. 5. 

*' Censure," says a late ingenious author, " is 
the tax a man pays to the pubhc for being emi- 
nent." It is a folly for an eminent man to think 
of escaping it, and a weakness to be affected with 
it. All the illustrious persons of antiquity, and, 6 
indeed, of every age in the world, liave passed 
through this fiery persecution. There is no de- 
fence against reproach, but obscurity; it is a kind 
of concomitant to greatness, as satires and invec- 
tives were an essential part of a Roman triumph, lo 



42 SIR ROGEtl DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

If men of eminence are exposed to censure on 
one hand, they are as much liable to flattery on 
the other. If they receive reproaches which are 
not due to them, they likewise receive praises 

5 which they do not deserve. In a word, the man 
in a high post is never regarded with an indiffer- 
ent eye, but always considered as a friend or an 
enemy. For this reason persons in great stations 
have seldom their true characters drawn till sev- 

10 eral years after their deaths. Their personal 
friendships and enmities must cease, and the par- 
ties they were engaged in be at an end, before 
their faults or their virtues can have justice done 
them. When Avriters have the least opportunities 

15 of knowing the truth, they are in the best disposi- 
tion to tell it. 

It is, therefore, the privilege of posterity to 
adjust the characters of illustrious persons, and 
to set matters right between those antagonists 

20 who by their rivalry for greatness divided a whole 
age into factions. We can now allow Ccesar to 
be a great man without derogating from Pompey ; 
and celebrate the virtues of Cato without detract- 
ing from those of Caesar. Every one that has 



THE SPECTATOR AND POSTERITY. 43 

been long dead has a due proportion of praise 
allotted him, in which whilst he lived his friends 
were too profuse, and his enemies too sparing. 

According to Sir Isaac Newton's calculations, 
the last comet that made its appearance in 1680, 5 
imbibed so much heat by its approaches to tlie 
sun, that it would have been two thousand times 
hotter than red hot iron, had it been a globe of 
that metal ; and that supposing it as big as the 
earth, and at the same distance from the sun, it 10 
woidd be fifty thousand years in cooling before it 
recovered its natural temper. In the like manner, 
if an Eno-lishman considers the great ferment into 
which our political world is thrown at present, 
and how intensely it is heated in all its parts, he 15 
cannot suppose that it will cool again in less than 
three hundred years. In such a tract of time it 
is possible that the heats of the present age may 
be extinguished, and our several classes of great 
men represented under their proper characters. 20 
Some eminent historian may then probably arise, 
that will not write recenfihus odiis (as Tacitus 
expresses it) with the passions and prejudices of 
a contemporary autlior, but make an impartial dis- 



44 81 R ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

tribution of fame among the great men of the 
present age. 

I cannot forbear entertaining myself very often 
with the idea of such an imaginary historian de- 

5 scribing the reign of Anne the First, and intro- 
ducing it with a preface to his reader ; that he is 
now entering upon the most shining part of the 
English story. The great rivals in fame will be 
then distinguished according to their respective 

10 merits, and shine in their proper points of light. 
Such an one (says the historian) though variously 
represented by the writers of his own age, appears 
to have been a man of more than ordinary abilities, 
great application, and uncommon integrity ; nor 

15 was such an one (though of an opposite party and 
interest) inferior to him in au}^ of these respects. 
The several antagonists who now endeavor to 
depreciate one another, and are celebrated or tra- 
duced by different parties, will then have the same 

20 body of admirers, and appear illustrious in the opin- 
ion of the whole British nation. The deserving 
man, who can now recommend himself to the esteem 
of but half his countrymen, will then receive the 
approbations and applauses of a whole age. 



THE SPECTATOR AND POSTERITY. 45 

Among the several persons that flourish in this 
glorious reign, there is no question but such a 
future historian as the person of whom I am 
speaking, will make mention of the men of genius 
and learning who have now any figure in the 5 
British nation. For my own part, I often flatter 
myself with the honorable mention which will 
then be made of me : and have drawn up a para- 
graph in my own imagination, that 1 fancy will 
not be altogether unlike what will be found in lo 
some page or other of this imaginary historian. 

It was under this reign, says he, that the Spec- 
tator published those little diurnal essays which 
are still extant. We know very little of the 
name or person of this author, except only that 15 
he was a man of a very short face, extremely 
addicted to silence, and so great a lover of knowl- 
edge that he made a voyage to Grand Cairo for 
no other reason, but to take the measure of a pyra- 
mid. His chief friend was one Sir Roger de Gov- 20 
erley, a whimsical country knight, and a templar 
whose name he has not transmitted to us. He 
lived as a lodger at the house of a widow-woman, 
and was a great humorist in all parts of his life. 



4G SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS, 

This is all we can affirm with any certainty of his 
person and character. As for his speculations, 
notwithstanding the several obsolete words and 
obscure phrases of the age in which he lived, we 

5 still understand enough of them to see the diver- 
sions and characters of the English nation in his 
time : not but that we are to make allowance for 
the mirth and humor of the author, who has 
doubtless strained many representations of things 

10 beyond the truth. For if we interpret his words 
in the literal meaning, we must suppose that 
women of the first quality used to pass away 
whole mornings at a puppet-show : that they 
attested their principles by their patches : that an 

15 audience would sit out an evening to hear a dra- 
matical performance written in a language which 
they did not understand : that chairs and flower- 
pots were introduced as actors upon the British 
stage : that a promiscuous assembly of men and 

20 women were allowed to meet at midnight in 
masques within the verge of the court; with 
many improbabilities of the like nature. We 
must therefore, in these and the like cases, sup- 
pose that these remote hints and allusions aimed 



THE SPECTATOR AND POSTERITY. 47 

at some certain follies which were then in vogue, 
and which at present we have not any notion of. 
We may guess by several passages in the Specu- 
lations that there were writers who endeavored 
to detract from the works of this author ; but as 5 
nothing of this nature is come down to us, we 
cannot guess at any objections that could be 
made to his paper. If we consider his style with 
that indulgence which we must show to old Eng- 
lish writers, or if we look into the variety of his 10 
subjects, with those several critical dissertations, 
moral reflections, ****** 



The following part of the paragraph is so much 
to my advantage, and beyond anything 1 can pre- 
tend to, that I hope my reader will excuse me for 
not inserting it. L. 



48 SIR ROGER UK COVERLEY PAPERS. 



SIR ROGER AT HOME. 

No. 106. 

Monday, July 2, 1711. 

Hie tibi copia 

Manabit ad plenum beiiigno 
Ruris honorum opiilenta cornu. 

HoR. 1 oa. xvii. 14. 

Having often received an invitation from my 
friend Sir Roger de Coverley to pass away a month 
with him in the country, I hist week accomj)anied 
him thither, and am settled with him for some 

5 time at his country-house, where I intend to form 
several of my ensuing speculations. Sir Roger, 
who is very well acquainted with my humor, lets 
me rise and go to bed when I please ; dine at his 
own table, or in my chamber, as I think fit; sit 

10 still and say nothing, without bidding me be 
merry. When the gentlemen of the country come 
to see him, he only shows me at a distance. As I 



SI Ft ROGER AT HOME. 49 

have been walking in the fieULs, I have observed 
them stealing a sight of me over an hedge, and 
have heard the knight desiring them not to let me 
see them, for that I hated to be stared at. 

I am the more at ease in Sir Roger's family, 5 
because it consists of sober and staid persons ; for 
as the knight is the best master in the world, he 
seldom changes his servants ; and as he is beloved 
by all about him, his servants never care for leav- 
ing him : by this means his domestics are all in 10 
years, and grown old with their master. You 
would take his valet de chambre for his brother: 
his butler is gray-headed ; his groom is one of the 
gravest men that 1 have ever seen ; and his coach- 
man has the looks of a privy-counsellor. You see 15 
the goodness of the master even in the old house- 
dog ; and in a gray pad that is kept in the stable 
with great care and tenderness out of regard for 
his past services, though he has been useless for 
several years. 20 

I could not but observe with a great deal of 
pleasure, the joy that appeared in the countenances 
of these ancient domestics upon my friend's arrival 
at his country-seat. Some of them could not re- 



50 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

frain from tears at the sight of their old master; 
every one of them pressed forward to do some- 
thing for him, and seemed discouraged if they 
were not employed. At the same time the good 

5 old knight, witli a mixture of the father and the 
master of the family, tempered the inquiries after 
his own affairs with several kind questions re- 
lating to themselves. This humanity and good- 
nature engages everybody to him, so that when he 

10 is pleasant upon any of them, all his family are in 
good humor, and none so much as the person 
whom he diverts himself with : on the contrary, 
if he coughs, or betrays any infirmity of old age, 
it is easy for a stander-by to observe a secret 

15 concern in the looks of all his servants. 

My worthy friend has put me under the particu- 
lar care of his butler, who is a very prudent man, 
and, as well as the rest of his fellow-servants, 
wonderfully desirous of pleasing me, because they 

20 have often heard their master talk of me as of his 
particular friend. 

My chief companion, when Sir Roger is divert- 
ing himself in the woods or the fields, is a very 
venerable man, who is ever with Sir Roger, and 



SIR ROGER AT HOME. 51 

has lived at his house in the nature of a chaplain 
about thirty years. This gentleman is a per- 
son of good sense, and some learning, of a very 
regular life, and obliging conversation : he heartily 
loves Sir Roger, and knows that he is very much 5 
in the old knight's esteem ; so that he lives in the 
family rather as a relation than a dependent. 

I have observed in several of my papers that 
my friend Sir Roger, amidst all his good qualities, 
is something of an humorist ; and that his virtues, 10 
as well as imperfections, are, as it were, tinged by 
a certain extravagance, which makes them par- 
ticularly his, and distinguishes them from those 
of other men. This cast of mind, as it is gener- 
ally very innocent in itself, so it renders his con- 15 
versation highly agreeable, and more delightful 
than the same degree of sense and virtue would 
appear in their common and ordinary colors. As 
I was walking with him last night, he asked me 
how I liked the good man whom I have just now 20 
mentioned ; and, without staying for my answer, 
told me that he was afraid of being insulted with 
Latin and Greek at his own table, for which rea- 
son he desired a particular friend of his at the 



52 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

University to find him out a clergyman rather of 
plain sense than much learning, of a good aspect, 
a clear voice, a sociable temper, and, if possible, a 
man that understood a little of backgammon. 

5 " My friend," says Sir Roger, '^ found me out this 
gentleman, who, besides the endowments required 
of him, is, they tell me, a good scholar, though he 
does not show it. I have given him the parson- 
age of the parish ; and because I know his value, 

10 have settled upon him a good annuity for life. If 
he outlives me, he shall find that he was higher 
in my esteem than perhaps he thinks he is. He 
has now been with me thirty years ; and, though 
he does not know I have taken notice of it, has 

16 never in all that time asked any thing of me for 
himself, though he is every day soliciting me for 
something in behalf of one or other of my tenants, 
his parishioners. There has not been a lawsuit in 
the parish since he has lived among them : if any 

20 dispute arises, they apply themselves to him for 
the decision ; if they do not acquiesce in his judg- 
ment, which I think never happened above once, 
or twice at most, they appeal to me. At his first 
settling with me, I made him a present of all the 



SIR ROGER AT HOME. 53 

good sermons which have been i)rinted in English, 
and only begged of him that every Sunday he 
would pronounce one of them in the pulpit. 
Accordingly, he has digested them into such a 
series, tliat they follow one another naturally, and 5 
make a continued system of practical divinity." 

As Sir Roger was going on in his story, the 
gentleman we were talking of came up to us: and 
upon the knight's asking him who preached to- 
morrow (for it was Saturday night), told us the 10 
Bishop of St. Asaph in the morning, and Dr. 
South in the afternoon. He then showed us his 
list of preachers for the whole year, where I saw 
with a great deal of pleasure Archbishop Tillotson, 
Bishop Saunderson, Dr. Barrow, Doctor Calamy, 15 
witli several living authors who have published 
discourses of practical divinity. I no sooner saw 
this venerable man in the pulpit, but I very much 
approved of my friend's insisting upon the quali- 
fications of a good aspect and a clear voice ; for I 20 
was so charmed with the gracefulness of his figure 
and delivery, as well as with the discourses he pro- 
nounced, that I think I never passed any time 
more to my satisfaction. A sermon repeated after 



54 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

this manner is like the composition of a poet in 
the mouth of a graceful actor. 

I could heartily wish that more of our country 
clergy would follow this example , and, instead of 

5 wasting their spirits in laborious compositions of 
their own, would endeavor after a handsome elo- 
cution and all those other talents that are proper 
to enforce what has been penned by greater mas- 
ters. This would not only be more easy to them- 

10 selves, but more edifying to the people. L. 



SIE ROGEirS DEPENDENTS. 55 



SIR ROGER'S DEPENDENTS. 
No. 107. 

Tuesday, July 3, 1711. 

^sopo ingentem statuam posueie Attici, 
Servumque collocaruiit aeterna in basi, 
Patere honoris scirent lit cnncti viani. 

Phaed. Epilog, i. 2. 

The reception, manner of attendance, undis- 
turbed freedom and quiet, which I meet with here 
in the country, has confirmed me in the opinic^i I 
always had, that the general corruption of manners 
in servants is owing to the conduct of masters. 5 
The aspect of every one in the family carries so 
much satisfaction, that it appears he knows the 
happy lot which has befallen him in being a mem- 
ber of it. There is one particular which I have 
seldom seen but at Sir Roger's ; it is usual in all lo 
other places that servants fly from the parts of 
the house through which their master is passing ; 
on the contrary, here, they industriously place 



56 SIR ROGER BE COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

themselves in his way ; and it is on both sides, as 
it were, understood as a visit, when the servants 
appear without calling. This proceeds from the 
humane and equal temper of the man of the house, 

5 who also perfectly well knows how to enjoy a great 
estate with such economy as ever to be much be- 
forehand. This makes his own mind untroubled, 
and consequently unapt to vent peevish expres- 
sions, or give passionate or inconsistent orders to 

10 those about him. Thus respect and love go to- 
gether; and a certain cheerfulness in performance 
of their duty is the particular distinction of the 
lower part of this family. When a servant is 
called before his master, he does not come with 

15 an expectation to hear himself rated for some 
trivial fault, threatened to be stripped, or used 
with any other unbecoming language, which mean 
masters often give to worthy servants ; but it is 
often to know what road he took that he came so 

20 readily back according to order ; whether he past 
by such a ground, if the old man who rents it is in 
good health : or whether he gave Sir Roger's love 
to him, or the like. 

A man who preserves a respect founded on his 



SIR ROGEWS DEPENDENTS. 57 

benevolence to his dependents, lives rather like a 
prince than a master in his family ; his orders are 
received as favors, rather than duties.; and the 
distinction of approaching him is part of the re- 
ward for executing what is commanded by him. 5 

There is another circumstance in which my 
friend excels in liis management, Avhich is the 
manner of rewarding his servants : he has ever 
been of opinion, that giving his cast clothes to be 
worn by valets has a very ill effect upon little 10 
minds, and creates a silly sense of equality between 
the parties, in persons affected only with outward 
things. I have heard him often pleasant on this 
occasion, and describe a young gentleman abusing 
his man in that coat which a month or two before 15 
was the most pleasing distinction he was con- 
scious of in himself. He would turn his discourse 
still more pleasantly upon the ladies' bounties of 
this kind; and I have heard him say he knew a 
fine woman, who distributed rewards and punish- 20 
ments in giving becoming or unbecoming dresses 
to her maids. 

But my good friend is above these little in- 
stances of good-will in bestowing only trifles on 



58 SIR liOGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

his servants; a good servant to him is sure of 
having it in his choice very soon of being no 
servant at all. As I have before observed, he is 
so good an husband, and knows so thoroughly that 

5 the skill of the purse is the cardinal virtue of this 
life ; I say, he knows so well that frugality is the 
support of generosity, that he can often spare a 
large fine when a tenement falls, and give that 
settlement to a good servant who has a mind to 

10 go into the world, or make a stranger pay the fine 
to that servant, for his more comfortable main- 
tenance, if he stays in his service. 

A man of honor and generosity considers it 
would be miserable to himself to have no will but 

15 that of another, though it were of the best person 
breathing, and for that reason goes on as fast as 
lie is able to put his servants into independent 
livelihoods. The greatest part of Sir Roger's 
estate is tenanted by persons who have served 

20 himself or his ancestors. It was to me extremely 
pleasant to observe the visitants from several parts 
to welcome his arrival into the country : and all 
the difference that I could take notice of between 
the late servants who came to see him, and those 



SIR ROGER'S DEPENDENTS. 59 

who staid in the family, was that these latter were 
looked upon as finer gentlemen and better courtiers. 

This manumission and placing them in a way 
of livelihood, I look upon as only what is due to 
a good servant, which encouragement will make 5 
his successor be as diligent, as humble, and as 
ready as he was. There is something wonderful 
in the narrowness of those minds, which can be 
pleased, and be barren of bounty to those who 
please them. 10 

One mio^ht on this occasion recount the sense 
that great persons in all ages have had of the 
merit of their dependents, and the heroic services 
which men have done their masters in the ex- 
tremity of their fortunes, and shown to their 15 
undone patrons, that fortune was all the differ- 
ence between them ; but as I design this my 
speculation only as a gentle admonition to thank- 
less masters, I shall not go out of the occurrences 
of common life, but assert it as a general observa- 20 
tion, that I never saw, but in Sir Roger's family, 
and one or two more, good servants treated as 
they ought to be. Sir Roger's kindness extends 
to their children's children, and this very morning 



60 SIR ROGFAl BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

he sent liis coachman's grandson to prentice. I 
shall conclude this paper with an account of a 
picture in his gallery, where there are many which 
will deserve my future observation. 

5 At the very upper end of this handsome struc- 
ture I saw the portraiture of two young men 
standing in a river, the one naked, the other in a 
livery. The person supported seemed half dead, 
but still so much alive as to show in his face 

10 exquisite joy and love towards the other. I 
thought the fainting figure resembled my friend 
Sir Roger ; and looking at the butler, who stood 
by me, for an account of it, he informed me that 
the person in the livery was a servant of Sir 

15 Roger's, who stood on the shore while his master 
was swimming, and observing him taken with 
some sudden illness, and sink under water, jumped 
in and saved him. He told me Sir Roger took off 
the dress he was in as soon as he came, and by a 

20 great bounty at that time, followed by his favor 
ever since, had made him master of that pretty 
seat which we saw at a distance as we came 
to this house. I remembered, indeed. Sir Roger 
said there lived a very worthy gentleman, to whom 



SIR ROGER'S DEPENDENTS. 61 

he was highly obliged, without mentioning any- 
thing furtiier. Upon my looking a little dissatis- 
fied at some part of the picture, my attendant 
informed me that it was against Sir Roger's will, 
and at the earnest request of the gentleman him- 
self, that he was drawn in the habit in which he 
had saved liis master. K. 



62 SIR ROGER DE COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 



THE COVERLET GUEST. 

No. 108. 

Wednesday, July 4, 1711. 
Gratis anhelans, multa agendo nihil agens. 

Ph^d. Fab. V. 2. 

As I was yesterday morning walking with Sir 
Roger before his house, a country felloAV brought 
him a huge fish, Avhich he told him Mr. William 
. Wimble had caught that very morning; and that 
5 he presented it with his service to him, and in- 
tended to come and dine with him. At the same 
time he delivered a letter, Avhich my friend read 
to me as soon as the messenger left him. 

" Sm Roger, 

10 "I DESIRE you to accept of a jack, Avhich is the best I 

have caught this season. I intend to come and stay with 

you a week, and see how the perch bite in the Black River. 

I observed with some concern, the last time I saw you 



THE COVERLET GUEST. (38 

Upon the Bowling-green, that your whip wanted a lash to 
it : I will bring half a dozen with me that I twisted last 
week, which I hop.e will serve you all the time you are in 
the country. I have not been out of the saddle for six 
days last past, having been at Eton with Sir John's eldest 5 
son. He takes to his learning hugely. 
" I am, Sir, 

" Your humble Servant, 

" Will. Wimble." 

This extraordinary letter and message that 10 
accompanied it, made me very curious to know 
the character and quality of the gentleman who 
sent them ; which I found to be as follows. Will 
Wimble is younger brother to a baronet, and de- 
scended of the ancient family of the Wimbles. 15 
He is now between forty and fifty ; but being bred 
to no business, and born to no estate, he generally 
lives with his elder brother as superintendent of 
his game. He hunts a pack of dogs better than any 
man in the country, and is very famous for find- 20 
ing out a hare. He is extremely well versed in 
all the little handicrafts of an idle man : he makes 
a May-fly to a miracle, and furnishes the whole 
country with angle-rods. As he is a good-natured, 
officious fellow, and very much esteemed upon 25 



t)4 SIB ROGER 1)JE COVERLET PAPERS. 

account of his family, he is a welcome guest at 
every house, and keeps up a good correspondence 
amonP" all the gfentlenien about him. He carries 
a tulip root in his pocket from one to another, or 

5 exchanges a puppy between a couple of friends 
that live perhaps in the opposite sides of the 
county. Will is a particular favorite of all the 
young heirs, whom he frequently obliges Avith a 
net that he has weaved, or a setting-dog that he 

10 has made himself : he now and then presents 
a pair of garters of his own knitting to their 
mothers or sisters ; and raises a great deal of 
mirth among them, by inquiring as often as he 
meets them, ' how they wear? ' These gentleman- 

15 like manufactures and obliging little humors 
make Will the darling of the country. 

Sir Roger was proceeding in the character of 
him, when he saw him make up to us with two or 
three hazel-tAvigs in his hand, that he had cut in 

20 Sir Roger's woods, as he came through them in 
his way to the house. I was very much pleased 
to observe on one side the hearty and sincere 
welcome A^ath which Sir Roger received him, and 
on the other, the secret joy which his guest dis- 



THE COVHRLEY GUEST. 



65 



covered at sight of the good old knight. After 
the hrst salutes were over, Will desired Sir Rog-er 
to lend him one of his servants to cany a set of 
shuttle-cocks, he had with him in a little box, to 
a lady that lived about a mile off, to whom it 5 
seems he had promised such a present for above 
this half year. Sir Roger's back was no sooner 
turned, but honest Will began to tell me of a laro-e 
cock pheasant that he had sprung i„ one of the 
neighboring woods, with two or three other 10 
adventures of the same nature. Odd and un- 
common characters are the game that I look for 
and most delight in; for which reason I was as 
much pleased with the novelty of the person that 
talked to me, as he could be for his life with the 15 
springing of a pheasant, and therefore listened to 
him with more than ordinary attention. 

In the midst of his discourse the bell rung to 
dmneis where the gentleman I have been speakin.. 
of had the pleasure of seeing the huge jack he 20 
had caught served up for the first dish in a most 
sumptuous manner. Upon our sitting down to it 
he gave us a long account how he had hooked it 
played with it, foiled it, and at length drew it out 



66 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

upon the bank, with several other particulars, 
that lasted all the first course. A dish of wild- 
fowl, that came afterwards, furnished conversa- 
tion for the rest of the dinner, which concluded 

5 with a late invention of Will's for improving the 
quail-pipe. 

Upon withdrawing into my room after dinner, 
I was secretly touched with compassion towards 
the honest gentleman that had dined with us ; 

10 and could not but consider with a great deal of 
concern, how so good an heart and such busy 
hands, were wholly employed in trifles; that so 
much humanity should be so little beneficial to 
others, and so much industry so little advan- 

15 tageous to himself. The same temper of mind 
and application to affairs might have recom- 
mended him to the public esteem, and have raised 
his fortune in another station of life. What good 
to his country or himself, might not a trader or 

20 merchant have done with such useful though 
ordinary qualifications ? 

Will Wimble's is the case of many a younger 
brother of a great family, who had rather see 
their children starve like gentlemen, than thrive 



THE COVE RLE Y GUEST. 67 

in a trade or profession that is beneath their 
quality. This huinor fills several parts of 
Europe with pride and beggary. It is the happi- 
ness of a trading nation, like ours, tliat the 
younger sons, though incapable of any liberal art 5 
or profession, may be placed in such a way of 
life as may perhaps enable them to vie with the 
best of their family : accordingly we find several 
citizens that were launched into the world with 
narrow fortunes, rising by an honest industry to 10 
greater estates than those of their elder brothers. 
It is not improbable but Will was formerly tried 
at divinity, law, or physic ; and that finding his 
genius did not lie that way, his parents gave him 
up at length to his own inventions. Bat certainly, 15 
however improper he might have been for studies 
of a higher nature, he was perfectly well turned 
for the occupations of trade and commerce. As 
I think this is a point which cannot be too much 
inculcated, I shall desire my reader to compare 20 
what I have liere written with what I have said in 
my twenty-first speculation. L. 



08 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



THE COVERLEY PORTRAITS. 
No. 109. 

Thursday, July 5, 1711. 
Abnormis sapiens 

HOR. Sat. ii. 2, 3. 

I WAS this morning walking in the gallery^ when 
Sir Roger entered at the end opposite to me, and 
advancing towards me, said he was glad to meet 
me among his relations the de Coverleys, and 

r) hoped I liked the conversation of so much good 
company, who were as silent as myself. I knew 
he alluded to the pictures, and as he is a gentleman 
who does not a little value himself upon his ancient 
descent, I expected he would give me some account 

10 of them. We were now arrived at the upper 
end of the gallery, when the knight faced towards 
one of the pictures, and as we stood before it, he 
entered into the matter, after his blunt way of say- 
ing things, as they occur to his imagination, with- 



THE COVERLEY PORTRAITS. 69 

out regular introduction, or care to preserve the 
appearance of chain of thought. 

" It is," said he, " worth while to consider the 
force of dress ; and how the persons of one age 
differ from those of another, merely by that only. 5 
One may observe also that the general fashion of 
one age has been followed by one particular set of 
people in another, and by them preserved from one 
generation to another. Thus the vast jetting coat 
and small bonnet, which was the habit in Ilany the 10 
Seventh's time, is kept on in the yeomen of the 
guard ; not without a good and politic view, because 
they look a foot taller, and a foot and a half 
broader : besides that, the cap leaves the face ex- 
panded, and consequently more terrible, and fitter 15 
to stand at the entrance of palaces. 

" This predecessor of ours, you see, is dressed 
after this manner, and his cheeks would be no 
larger than mine, were he in a hat as I am. He 
was the last man that won a prize in the Tilt-Yard 20 
(which is now a common street before Whitehall). 
You see the broken lance that lies there by his 
right foot ; he shivered that lance of liis adversary 
all to pieces ; and, bearing himself, look you, sir. 



70 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

in this manner, at tlie same time he came within the 
target of the gentleman who rode against him, and 
taking him with incredible force before him on the 
pommel of his saddle, he in that manner rid the 

5 tournament over, with an air that showed he did it 
rather to perform the rule of the lists than expose 
his enemy : however, it appeared he knew how to 
make use of a victory, and with a gentle trot he 
marched up to a gallery where their mistress sat 

10 (for they were rivals), and let him down with 
laudable courtesy and pardonable insolence. I 
don't know but it might be exactly where the 
coffee-house is now. 

" You are to know this my ancestor was not only 

15 of a military genius, but fit also for the arts of 
peace, for he played on the bass-viol as well as any 
gentleman at court ; you see where his viol hangs 
by his basket-hilt sword. The action at the Tilt- 
Yard you may be sure won the fair lady, who was 

20 a maid of honor and the greatest beauty of her 
time ; here she stands, the next picture. You see, 
sir, my great-great-great-grandmother has on the 
new-fashioned petticoat, except that the modern is 
gathered at the waist ; my grandmother appears as 



THE COVERLEY PORTRAITS. 71 

if she stood in a large drum, whereas the ladies 
now walk as if they were in a go-cart. For all this 
lady was bred at court, she became an excellent 
country wife, she brought ten children, and when 
I show you the library, you shall see in her own 5 
hand (allowing for the difference of the language) 
the best receipt now in England both for an hasty- 
pudding and a white-pot. 

" If you please to fall back a little, because 'tis 
necessary to look at the three next pictures at one 10 
view; these are three sisters. She on the right 
hand, who is so very beautiful, died a maid ; the 
next to her, still handsomer, had the same fate, 
against her will ; this homely thing in the middle 
had both their portions added to her own, and was 15 
stolen by a neighboring gentleman, a man of 
stratagem and resolution, for he poisoned three 
mastiffs to come at her, and knocked down two 
deer-stealers in carrying her off. Misfortunes 
happen in all families : the theft of this romp and 20 
so much money was no great matter to our estate. 
But the next heir that possessed it was this soft 
gentleman, whom you see there : observe the small 
buttons, the little boots, the laces, the slashes 



72 ."SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

about his clothes, and, above all, the posture he is 
drawn in (which to be sure was his own choosing) ; 
you see he sits with one hand on a desk writing, 
and looking, as it were, another way, like an easy 

5 writer, or a sonneteer ; he was one of those that had 
too much wit to know how to live in the world ; he 
was a man of no justice, but great good manners ; 
he ruined everybody that had anything to do with 
him, but never said a rude thing in his life ; the 

10 most indolent person in the world, he would sign 
a deed that passed away half his estate with his 
gloves on, but would not put on his hat before a 
lady if it were to save his country. He is said to 
be the first that made love by squeezing the hand. 

15 He left the estate with ten thousand pounds debt 
upon it, but, however, by all hands I have been in- 
formed that he was every way the finest gentleman 
in the world. That debt lay heavy on our house 
for one generation, but it was retrieved by a gift 

20 from that honest man you see there, a citizen of our 
name, but nothing at all a-kin to us. I know Sir 
Andrew Freeport has said behind my back, that 
this man was descended from one of the ten 
children of the maid of honor I showed you above ; 



THE COVERLEY PORTRAITS. T3 

but it was never made out. We winked at the 
tiling, indeed, because money was wanting at that 
time." 

Here I, saw my friend a little embarrassed, and 
turned my face to tlie next portraiture. 5 

Sir Roger went on with his account of the 
gallery in the following manner. '' This man " 
(pointing to him I looked at) " I take to be the 
honor of our house, Sir Humphrey de Coverley ; 
he was in his dealings as punctual as a tradesman, lo 
and as generous as a gentleman. He would have 
thought himself as much undone by breaking his 
word, as if it were to be followed by bankruptcy. 
He served his country as knight of this shire to his 
dying day. He found it no easy matter to main- 15 
tain an integrity in his words and actions, even in 
tilings that regarded the offices which were incum- 
bent upon him, in the care of his own affairs and 
relations of life, and, therefore, dreaded (though 
he had great talents) to go into employments of 20 
state, where he must be exposed to the snares of 
ambition. Innocence of life and great ability were 
tlie distinguishing parts of his character ; the latter, 
he had often observed, had led to the destruction 



74 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

of the former, and used frequently to lament that 
great and good had not the same signification. He 
was an excellent husbandman, but had resolved 
not to exceed such a degree of wealth ; all above 

5 it he bestowed in secret bounties many years after 
the sum he aimed at for his own use was attained. 
Yet he did not slacken his industry, but to a 
decent old age spent the life and fortune which 
was superfluous to himself in the service of his 

10 friends and neighbors." 

Here we were called to dinner, and Sir Roger 
ended the discourse of this gentleman by telling 
me, as we followed the servant, that this his 
ancestor was a brave man, and narrowly escaped 

15 being killed in the Civil Wars ; " for," said he, " he 
was sent out of the field upon a private message, 
the day before the battle of Worcester." The 
whim of narrowly escaping by having been within 
a day of danger, with other matters above-men- 

20 tioned, mixed with good sense, left me at a loss 
whether I was more delighted with my friend's 
wisdom or simplicit}^ R. 



GHOSTS. 75 



GHOSTS. 
No. 110. 

Friday, July 6, 1711. 

Horror ubique animos, simul ipsa silentia terrent. 

ViRG. Mn. ii. 755. 

At a little distance from Sir Roger's house, 
among the ruins of an old abbey, there is a long 
walk of aged elms, which are shot up so very 
high, that when one passes under them, the rooks 
and crows that rest upon the tops of them seem 5 
to be cawing in another region. I am very much 
delighted with this sort of noise, which I consider 
as a kind of natural prayer to that Being who 
supplies the wants of his whole creation, and who, 
in the beautiful language of the Psalms, feedeth 10 
the young ravens that call upon him. I like this 
retirement the better, because of an ill report it 
lies under of being haunted ; for which reason (as 
I have been told in the family) no living creature 



76 SIR ROGER 1)E COVERLET PAPERS. 

ever walks in it besides the chaplain. My good 
friend the butler desired me, with a very grave 
face, not to venture myself in it after sunset, for 
that one of the footmen had been almost frightened 

5 out of his wits by a spirit that appeared to him in 
the shape of a black horse without an head ; to 
which he added that about a month ago one of 
the maids, coming home late tliat way with a pail 
of milk upon her head, heard such a rustling 

10 among the bushes that she let it fall. 

I was taking a walk in this place last night 
between the hours of nine and ten, and could not 
but fancy it one of the most proper scenes in the 
world for a ghost to appear in. The ruins of 

15 the abbey are scattered up and down on every 
side, and half covered with ivy and elder bushes, 
the harbors of several solitary bii'ds, which seldom 
make their appearance till the dusk of the even- 
ing. The place was formerly a church-yard and 

20 has still several marks in it of graves and burying- 
places. There is such an echo among the old 
ruins and vaults that if you stamp but a little 
louder than ordinary, you hear the sound repeated. 
At the same time the walk of elms, with the 



GHOSTS. 77 

croaking of the ravens, which from time to time 
are heard from the tops of them, looks exceeding 
solemn and venerable. These objects naturally 
raise seriousness and attention : and when night 
heightens the awfulness of the place, and pours 5 
out her supernumerary horrors upon every thing 
in it, I do not at all wonder that weak minds fill 
it with spectres and apparitions. 

Mr. Locke, in his chapter of the association of 
ideas, has very curious remarks to show how by lo 
the prejudice of education one idea often intro- 
duces into the mind a whole set that bear no 
resemblance to one another in the nature of thino-s. 

o 

Among several examples of this kind, he produces 
the following instance. ' The ideas of goblins 15 
and sprites have really no more to do with dark- 
ness than light : yet let but a foolish maid incul- 
cate these- often on the mind of a child, and raise 
them there together, possibly he shall never be 
able to separate them again so long as he lives ; 20 
but darkness shall ever afterward bring with it 
those frightful ideas, and they shall be so joined 
that he can no more bear the one than the other." 
As I was walking in this solitude, where the 



78 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

dusk of the evening conspired with so many other 
occasions of terror, I observed a cow grazing not 
far from me, Avhich an imagination that is apt to 
startle might easily have construed into a black 

5 horse without an head : and I dare say the poor 
footman lost his wits upon some such trivial 
occasion. 

My friend Sir Roger has often told me with a 
great deal of mirth that at his first coming to his 

10 estate, he found three parts of his house altogether 
useless ; that the best room in it had the reputa- 
tion of being haunted, and by that means was 
locked up ; that noises had been heard in his long 
gallery, so that he could not get a servant to enter 

15 it after eight o'clock at night ; that the door of 
one of his chambers was nailed up, because there 
went a story in the family that a butler had 
formerly hanged himself in it ; and that his 
mother, who lived to a great age, had shut up 

20 half the rooms in the house, in which either her 
husband, a son or daughter, had died. The knight, 
seeing his habitation reduced to so small a com- 
pass, and himself in a manner shut out of his 
own house, upon the death of liis mother ordered 



GHOSTS. 79 

all the apartments to be flung open and exorcised 
by his chaplain, who lay in every room one after 
another, and by that means dissipated the fears 
which had so long reigned iii the family. 

I should not have been thus particular upon 5 
these ridiculous horrors, did not I find them so 
very much prevail in all i^Q,vts of the country. 
At the same time I think a person who is thus 
terrified with the imagination of ghosts and spec- 
tres much more reasonable, than one who, contrary lO 
to the reports of all historians, sacred and profane, 
ancient and modern, and to the traditions of all 
nations, thinks the appearance of spirits fabulous 
and groundless. L. 



80 SIR ROGKR DE COVEKLEY PAPERS. 



SUNDAY AT SIR ROGER^S. 
No. 112. 

Monday, July 9, 1711. 
' Adavdrovs jxkv irpCJTa deovs, vdfxip d>s 8idK€LTat, 

Pythagoras. 

I AM always very well pleased with a country 
Sunday; and think, if keeping holy the seventh 
day were only a human institution, it would be 
the best method that could have been thought of 

5 for the polishing and civilizing of mankind. It is 
certain the country-people would soon degenerate 
into a kind of savages and barbarians, Avere there 
not such frequent returns of a stated time, in 
which the whole village meet together with their 

10 best faces, and in their cleanliest habits, to con- 
verse with one another upon indifferent subjects, 
hear their duties explained to them, and join to- 
gether in adoration of the Supreme Being. Sunday 



SUNDAY AT SIR lUJGEWS. 81 

clears away the rust of the whole week, not only 
as it refreshes in their minds the notions of reli- 
i,aon, but as it puts both the sexes upon appearing 
in their most agreeable forms, and exerting all such 
(luaiities as are apt to give them a figure in the 5 
eye of the village. A country-fellow distinguishes 
himself as much in the Church-yard, as a citizen 
does upon the Change, the whole parish politics 
being generally discussed in that place either after 
sermon or before the bell rings. ■ lo 

My friend Sir Roger, being a good churchman, 
lias beautified the inside of his church with several 
texts of his own choosing ; he has likewise given 
a handsome pulpit-cloth, and railed in the commu- 
nion-table at his own expense. He has often told 15 
me that at his coming to his estate he found his 
parishioners very irregular ; and that in order to 
make them kneel and join in the responses, he 
gave every one of them a hassock and a common- 
prayer-book ; and at the same time employed an 20 
itinerant singing-master, who goes about the coun- 
try for that purpose, to instruct them rightly in 
the tunes of the psalms; upon which they now 
very much value tliemselves, and indeed out-do 



82 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

most of the country churches that I have ever 
heard. 

As Sir Roger is hindlord to the whole congrega- 
tion, lie keeps them in very good order, and will 

5 suffer nobody to sleep in it besides himself ; for if 
by chance he has been surprised into a short nap 
at sermon, upon recovering out of it he stands up 
and looks about him, and if he sees anybody else 
nodding, either wakes them himself, or sends his 

10 servant to them. Several other of the old knight's 
particularities break out upon these occasions : 
sometimes he will be lengthening out a verse in 
the singing-psalms half a minute after the rest of 
the congregation have done with it; sometimes, 

15 when he is pleased with the matter of his devo- 
tion, he pronounces Amen three or four times to 
the same prayer; and sometimes stands up when 
everybody else is upon their knees, to count the 
congregation, or see if any of his tenants are 

20 missing. 

I was yesterday very much surprised to hear 
my old friend in the midst of the service calling 
out to one John Matthews to mind what he was 
about, and not disturb the congregation. This 



SUNDAY AT SIE EOGER'S. 83 

John Matthews, it seems, is remarkable for being 
an idle fellow, and at that time was kicking his 
heels for his diversion. This authority of the 
knight, though exerted in that odd manner which 
accompanies him in all circumstances of life, has 5 
a very good effect upon the parish, who are not 
polite enough to see anything ridiculous in his 
behavior ; besides that the general good sense and 
worthiness of his character make his friends ob- 
serve these little singularities as foils that rather 10 
set off than blemish his good qualities. 

As soon as the sermon is finished, nobody pre- 
sumes to stir till Sir Roger is gone out of the 
church. The knight walks down from his seat in 
the chancel between a double row of his tenants, 15 
that stand bowing to him on each side ; and every 
now and then inquires how such an one's wife, 
or mother, or son, or father do, whom he does 
not see at church ; which is understood as a secret 
reprimand to the person that is absent. 20 

The chaplain has often told me that upon a 
catechising-day when Sir Roger has been pleased 
with a boy that answers well, he has ordered a 
Bible to be given him next day for his encourage- 



84 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

ment; and sometimes accompanies it with a flitch 
of bacon to his mother. Sir Roger has likewise 
added five pounds a year to the clerk's place ; and 
that he may encourage the young fellows to make 

5 themselves perfect in the church-service, has prom- 
ised, upon the death of the present incumbent, 
who is very old, to bestow it according to merit. 

The fair understanding between Sir Roger and 
his chaplain, and their mutual concurrence in doing 

10 good, is the more remarkable, because the very 
next village is famous for the differences and con- 
tentions that rise between the parson and the 
'squire, who live in a perpetual state of war. The 
parson is always preaching at the 'squire, and the 

15 'squire to be revenged on the parson never comes 
to church. The 'squire has made all his tenants 
atheists and tithe-stealers ; while the parson in- 
structs them every Sunday in the dignity of his 
order, and insinuates to them in almost every ser- 

20 mon that he is a better man than his patron. In 
short, matters are come to such an extremity that 
the 'squire has not said his prayers either in pub- 
lic or private this half year; and that the parson 
threatens him, if he does not mend his manners, 



SUNDAY AT SIR ROGER'S. 85 

to pray for him in the face of the whole congrega- 
tion. 

F'euds of this nature, though too frequent in the 
country, are very fatal to the orclijiaiy people ; 
who are so used to be dazzled with riches, that 5 
they pay as much deference to the understanding 
of a man of an estate, as of a man of learning ,- and 
are very hardly brought to regard any truth, how 
important soever it may be, that is preached to 
them, when they know there are several men of 10 
five hundred a year who do not believe it. L. 



86 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



SIR ROGER'S ROMANCE. 

No. 113. 

Tuesday, July 10, 1711. 

Haerent inlixi pectore vultus. 

VlliG. ^11. iv. 4. 

In my first description of tlie company in which 
I passed most of my time, it may be remembered 
that I mentioned a great affliction whicli my friend 
Sir Roger liad met witli in his youth ; wliich was 
no less than a disappointment in love. It hap- 
pened this evening that we fell into a pleasing 
walk at a distance from his house : as soon as we 
came into it, " It is," quoth the good old man, 
looking round him with a smile, " very hard that 
any part of my land should be settled upon one 
who has used me so ill as the perverse widow did ; 
and yet I am sure I could not sell a sprig of any 
bough of this whole walk of trees, but I should 
reflect upon her and her severity. She has cer- 



SIR ROGER'S ROMANCE. 87 

tainly the finest hand of any woman in the world. 
You are to know this was the phice wherein 1 
used to muse upon her ; and by that custom I can 
never come into it, but the same tender sentiments 
revive in my mind, as if I had actually walked 5 
with that beautiful creature under these shades. 
I have been fool enough to carve her name on the 
bark of several of these trees ; so unhappy is the 
condition of men in love, to attempt the removing 
of their passion by the methods which serve only lo 
to imprint it deeper. She has certainly the finest 
hand of any woman in tlie world." 

Here followed a profound silence ; and I was 
not displeased to observe my friend falling so nat- 
urally into a discourse which 1 had ever before 15 
taken notice he industriously avoided. After a 
very long pause, he entered upon an account of 
this great circumstance in his life, with an air 
which, I thought, raised my idea of him above 
what I had ever had before ; and gave me the 20 
picture of that cheerful mind of his, before it re- 
ceived that stroke which has ever since affected 
his words and actions. But he went on as fol- 
lows : 



88 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS 

" I came to my estate in my twenty-second year, 
and resolved to follow the steps of the most 
worthy of my ancestors who have inhabited this 
spot of earth before me, in all the methods of 

5 hospitality and good neighborhood, for the sake 
of my fame ; and in country sports and recrea- 
tions, for the sake of my health. In my twenty- 
third year I Avas obliged to serve as sheriff of the 
county; and in my servants, officers, and whole 

10 equipage, indulged the pleasure of a young man 
(who did not think ill of his own person) in 
taking that public occasion of shoAving my figure 
and behavior to advantage. You may easily im- 
agine to yourself what appearance I made, who 

15 am pretty tall, rid well, and was very well dressed, 
at the head of a whole county, with music before 
me, a feather in my hat, and my horse well bitted. 
I can assure you 1 was not a little pleased with the 
kind looks and glances I had from all the balconies 

20 and windows as I rode to the hall where the assizes 
were held. But when I came there, a beautiful 
creature in a widow's habit sat in court to hear 
the event of a cause concerning her dower. This 
commanding creature (who was born for destruc- 



SIR ROGEIVS ROMANCE. 89 

tion of all who behold her) put on such a resigna- 
tion in her countenance, and bore the whispers of 
all around the court with such a pretty uneasiness, 
I warrant you, and then recovered herself from 
one eye to another, 'till she was perfectly confused 5 
by meeting soinethiug so wistful in all she en- 
countered, that at last, with a murrain to her, she 
cast her bewitching eye upon me. I no sooner 
met it, but I bowed like a great surprised booby ; 
and kuowing her cause to be the first which came 10 
on, I cried, like a captivated calf as I was, ' Make 
way for the defendant's witnesses.' This sudden 
partiality made all the county immediately see the 
sheriff also was become a slave to the fine widow. 
During the time her cause was upon trial she be- 15 
haved herself, I warrant you, with such a deep 
attention to her business, took opportunities to 
have little billets handed to her counsel, then 
would be in such a pretty confusion, occasioned, 
you must know, by acting before so much company, 20 
that not only I but the whole court was prejudiced 
in her favor ; and all that the next heir to her 
husband had to urge, was thought so groundless 
and frivolous, that when it came to her counsel to 



90 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

reply, there was not half so much said as every 
one besides in the court thought he could have 
urged to her advantage. You must understand, 
sir, this perverse Avoman is one of those unac- 

5 countable creatures that secretly rejoice in the 
admiration of men, but indulge themselves in no 
further consequences. Hence it is that she has 
ever had a train of admirers, and she removes 
from her slaves in town to those in the country, 

10 according to the seasons of the j^ear. She is a 
reading lady, and far gone in the pleasures of 
friendship ; she is always accompanied by a confi- 
dant, who is witness to her daily protestations 
against our sex, and consequently a bar to her 

15 first steps towards love, upon the strength of her 
own maxims and declarations. 

However, I must needs say this accomplished 
mistress of mine has distinguished me above the 
rest, and has been known to declare Sir Roger de 

20 Coverley was the tamest and most human of all the 
brutes in the country. I was told she said so, by 
one who thought he rallied me ; but upon the 
strength of this slender encouragement, of being 
thought least detestable, I made new liveries, new- 



SIR ROGER'S ROMANCE. 91 

paired my coach-horses, sent them all to town to 
be bitted, and taught to throw their legs well, and 
move all together, before I pretended to cross the 
country and wait upon her. As soon as I thought 
my retinue suitable to the character of my fortune 5 
and youth, I set out from hence to make my 
addresses. The particular skill of this lady has 
ever been to inflame your wishes, and yet com- 
mand respect. To make her mistress of this art, 
slie has a greater share of knowledge, wit and good 10 
sense, than is usual even among men of merit. 
Then she is beautiful beyond the race of women. 
If you won't let her go on with a certain artifice 
with her eyes, and the skill of beauty, she will 
arm herself with her real charms, and strike you 15 
with admiration instead of desire. It is certain 
that if you were to behold the whole woman, there 
is that dignity in her aspect, that composure in her 
motion, that complacency in her manner, that if 
her form makes you hope, her merit makes you 20 
fear. But then again, she is such a desperate 
scholar that no country gentleman can approach 
her without being a jest. As I was going to tell 
you, when I came to her house I was admitted to 



92 SIR ROGUE I)E COVERLEY PAPERS. 

her presence Avith great civility ; at the same time 
she placed herself to be first seen by me in such 
an attitude, as I think you call the posture of a 
picture, that she discovered new charms, and I at 

5 last came towards her with such an awe as made 
me speechless. This she no sooner observed but 
she made her advantage of it, and began a dis- 
course to me concerning love and honor, as they 
both are followed by pretenders and the real 

10 votaries to them. When she had discussed these 
points in a discourse, which I verily believe was 
as learned as the best philosopher in Europe could 
possibly make, she asked me whether she was so 
happy as to fall in with my sentiments on these 

15 important particulars. Her confidant sat by her, 
and upon my being in the last confusion and 
silence, this malicious aid of hers, turning to her, 
says, ' I am very glad to observe Sir Roger pauses 
upon this subject, and seems resolved to deliver 

20 all his sentiments upon the matter when he pleases 
to speak.' They both kept their countenances, 
and after I had sat half an hour meditating how 
to behave before such profound casuists, I rose up 
and took my leave. Chance has since that time 



Slli ROGER'S ROMANCE. 93 

thrown me very often in her way, and she as often 
has directed a discourse to me wliich I do not 
understand. This barbarity has kept me ever at 
a distance from the most beautiful object my eyes 
ever beheld. It is thus also she deals with all 5 
mankind, and you must make love to her, as 
you would conquer the sphinx, by posing her. 
But were she like other women, and that there 
were any talking to her, how constant must the 
pleasure of that man be who could converse with lo 

a creature But, after all, you may be sure 

her heart is fixed on some one or other ; and yet I 
have been credibly informed — but who can believe 
half that is said ? After she had done speaking 
to me, she put her hand to her bosom and adjusted 15 
her tucker. Then she cast her eyes a little down, 
upon my beholding her too earnestly. They say 
she sings excellently : her voice in her ordinary 
speech has something in it inexpressibly sweet. 
You must know that I dined with her at a public 20 
table the day after I first saw her, and she helped 
me to some tansy in the eye of all the gentlemen 
in the country : she has certainly the finest hand 
of any woman in the world. I can assure you, 



94 iSin ROGER 1)E COVERLEY PAPERS. 

sir, were you to l)ehol(I her, you would be \\\ the 
same conditiou ; for as her speech is music, lier 
form is angelic. But I find I grow irregular 
while I am talking of her ; but, indeed, it 

5 would be stupidity to be unconcerned at such 
perfection. Oh the excellent creature, she is as 
inimitable to all women, as she is inaccessible to 
all men." 

I found my friend begin to rave, and insensibly 

10 led him towards the house, that we miglit be 
joined by some other company ; and am convinced 
that the widow is the secret cause of all lliat incon- 
sistency which appears in some parts of my 
friend's discourse ; thougli lie lias so much com- 

15 maud of himself as not directly to mention her, 
yet according to that of Martial, wliich one knows 
not how to render in English, " Bum taect hanc 
loquitur.'' I shall end this paper with that whole 
epigram, which represents with much humor my 

20 honest friend's condition. 

" Qnicquitl agit Rufus nihil est nisi Naevi.i nifo, 
Si gaudet, si flet, si tacol, hanc Uxjuitur: 
Coenat, j)ro])inat, ])Oscit, ncoMt, anniiit, una est 
Naevia; si non sit Naevia nuitiis erit. 



SIR 1WGER\S ROMANCE. 95 

Scriberet hesterna, patri cum luce salutem, 
Naevialux, inqiiit, Naevia lumen, ave." 

Let Rufus weep, rejoice, stand, sit, or walk, 

Still he can nothing- but of Naevia talk ; 

Let him eat, drink, ask questions, or dispute. 

Still he must speak of Naevia, or be mute. 

He writ to his father, ending with this line, 

♦ I am, my lovely Naevia, ever thine.'' " R. 



96 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



TRUE AND FALSE ECONOMY. 
No. 114. 

Paupertatis pudor et fuga. 

HOR. Ep. 1. xviii. 24. 

Economy in our affairs has the same effect 
upon our fortunes which good breeding has upon 
our conversations. There is a pretending behavior 
in both cases, which, instead of making men 

5 esteemed, renders them both miserable and con- 
temptible. We had yesterday at Sir Roger's a 
set of country gentlemen who dined with him ; 
and after dinner the glass was taken, by those 
who pleased, pretty plentifully. Among others 

10 I observed a person of a tolerable good aspect, who 
seemed to be more greedy of liquor than any of 
the company, and yet, methought, he did not 
taste it with delight. As he grew warm, he was 
suspicious of everything that was said ; and as he 

15 advanced towards being fuddled, his humor grew 



TtiUE AND FALSE ECONOMY. 97 

worse. At the same time his bitterness seemed 
to be rather an inward dissatisfaction in his own 
mind, than any dislike he had taken at the com- 
pany. Upon hearing his name, I knew him to 
be a gentleman of considerable fortune in this 5 
county, but greatly in debt. What gives the 
unhappy man this peevishness of spirit is, that his 
estate is dipped, and is eating out with usury ; 
and yet he has not the heart to sell any part of it. 
His proud stomach, at the cost of restless nights, lo 
constant inquietudes, danger of affronts, and a 
thousand nameless inconveniences, preserves this 
canker in his fortune, rather than it shall be said 
he is a man of fewer hundreds a year than he has 
been commonly reputed. Thus he endures the 15 
torment of poverty, to avoid the name of being 
less rich. If you go to his house, you see great 
plenty, but served in a manner that shows it is all 
unnatural, and that the master's mind is not at 
home. There is a certain waste and carelessness 20 
in the air of everything, and the whole appears 
but a covered indigence, a magnificent poverty. 
That neatness and cheerfulness which attends the 
tal)le of him who lives within compass, is want- 



98 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

ing, and exchanged for a libertine way of service 
in all about him. 

This gentleman's conduct, though a very com- 
mon way of management, is as ridiculous as that 

5 officer's would be who had but few men under 
his command, and should take the charge of an 
extent of country rather than of a small pass. 
To pay for, personate, and keep in a man's hands, 
a greater estate than he really has, is, of all others, 

10 the most unpardonable vanity, and must in the 
end reduce tlie man who is guilty of it to dis- 
honor. Yet, if we look round us in any county 
of Great Britain, we shall see many in this fatal 
error — if that may be called by so soft a name 

15 which proceeds from a false shame of appearing 
what they really are — when the contrary behavior 
would in a short time advance them to the con- 
dition which they pretend to. 

Laertes has fifteen hundred pounds a year, 

20 which is mortgaged for six thousand pounds ; but 
it is impossible to convince him that if he sold as 
much as would pay off that debt, he would save 
four shillings in the pound, which he gives for 
the vanity of being the reputed master of it. 



TRUE AND FALSE ECONOMY. 99 

Yet, if Laertes did tliis, he would, perhaps, be 
easier in his own fortune ; but then Irus, a fellow 
of yesterday, who has but twelve hundred a year, 
would be his equal. Rather than this shall be, 
Laertes goes on to bring well-born beggars into 5 
the world, and every twelvemonth charges his 
estate with at least one year's rent by the birth of 
a child. 

Laertes and Irus are neighbors, whose way of 
living are an abomination to each other. Irus is lo 
moved by the fear of pvoerty, and Laertes by the 
shame of it. Though the motive of action is of 
so near affinity in both, and may be resolved into 
this, " That to each of them poverty is the greatest 
of all evils," yet are their manners very widely 15 
different. Shame of poverty makes Laertes 
launch into unnecessary equipage, vain expense, 
and lavish entertainments ; fear of poverty makes 
Irus allow himself only plain necessaries, appear 
without a servant, sell his own corn, attend his 20 
laborers, and be himself a laborer. Shame of 
poverty makes Laertes go every day a step nearer 
to it ; and fear of poverty stirs up Irus to make 
every day some further progress from it. 

L.ofC. 



100 SIR ROGER DE COVER LEY PAPERS. 

These different motives produce the excesses 
which men are guilty of in tlie negligence of and 
provision for themselves. Usury, stock- jobbing, 
extortion, and oppression have their seed in the 

5 dread of want ; and vanity, riot, and prodigality 
from the shame of it : but both these excesses are 
infinitely below the pursuit of a reasonable 
creature. After we have taken care to command 
so much as is necessary for maintaining ourselves 

10 in the order of men suitable to our character, the 
care of superfluities is a vice no less extravagant 
than the neglect of necessaries would have been 
before. 

It would, methinks, be no ill maxim of life if, 

15 according to that ancestor of Sir Roger Avhom I 
lately mentioned, every man would j^oint to him- 
self what sum he would resolve not to exceed. 
He might by this means cheat himself into a tran- 
quillity on this side of that expectation, or convert 

20 what he should get above it to nobler uses than 
his own pleasures or necessities. This temper of 
mind would exempt a man from an ignorant envy 
of restless men above him, and a more inexcusable 
contempt of happy men below him. This would 



TRUE AND FALSE ECONOMY. 101 

be sailing by some compass, living with some de- 
sign ; but to be eternally bewildered in prospects 
of future gain, and putting on unnecessary armor 
against improbable blows of fortune, is a mechanic 
being which has not good sense for its direction, 5 
but is carried on by a sort of acquired instinct 
towards things below our consideration and un- 
worthy our esteem. It is possible that the tran- 
quillity I now enjoy at Sir Roger's may have 
created in me this way of thinking, which is so 10 
abstracted from the common relish of the world : 
but as I am now in a pleasing arbor, surrounded 
with a beautiful landscape, I find no inclination 
so strong as to continue in these mansions, so 
remote from the ostentatious scenes of life ; and 15 
am at this present writing philosopher enough to 
conclude with Mr. Cowley : 

If e'er ambition did ray fancy cheat, 

With any wish so mean as to be great ; 

Continue, Heaven, still from me to remove 20 

The humble blessings of that life I love. 

T. 



102 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



THE SOUND MIND IN THE SOUND 
BODY. 

No. 115. 



Thursday, Juhj 12, 1711. 

Ut sit mens saua in corpore sano. 

Juv. Sat. X. 356. 



Bodily labor is of two kinds ; either that 
which a man submits to for his livelihood, or that 
which he undergoes for his pleasure. The latter 
of them generally changes the name of labor for 

5 that of exercise, but differs only from ordinary 
labor as it rises from another motive. 

A country life abounds in both these kinds of 
labor, and for that reason gives a man a greater 
stock of health, and consequently a more perfect 

10 enjoyment of himself, than any other way of life. 
I consider the body as a system of tubes and 
glands, or to use a more rustic phrase, a bundle of 
pipes and strainers, fitted to one another after so 



THE SOUND MIND IN THE SOUND BODY. 103 

wonderful a manner, as to make a proper engine 
for the soul to work with. This description does 
not only comprehend the bowels, bones, tendons, 
veins, nerves, and arteries, but every muscle and 
every ligature, which is a composition of fibres, 5 
that are so many imperceptible tubes or pipes 
interwoven on all sides with invisible glands or 
strainers. 

This general idea of a human body, without 
considering it in the niceties of anatomy, lets us 10 
see how absolutely necessary labor is for the 
right preservation of it. There must be frequent 
motions and agitations, to mix, digest, and separate 
the juices contained in it, as well as to clear and 
cleanse that infinitude of pipes and strainers of 15 
which it is composed, and to give their solid parts 
a more firm and lasting tone. Labor or exercise 
ferments the humors, casts them into their proper 
channels, throws oi¥ redundancies, and helps nature 
in those secret distributions without which the 20 
body cannot subsist in its vigor, nor the soul act 
with cheerfulness. 

I might here mention the effects which this has 
upon all the faculties of the mind, by keeping the 



104 SIR ROGER I)E COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

understanding clear, the imagination untroubled, 
and refining those spirits that are necessary for 
the proper exertion of our intellectual faculties, 
during the present laws of union between soul 

5 and body. It is to a neglect in this particular 
that we must ascribe the spleen, which is so fre- 
quent in men of studious and sedentary tempers, 
as well as the vapors to which those of the other 
sex are so often subject. 

10 Had not exercise been absolutely necessary for 
our well-being, nature would not have made the 
body so proper for it, by giving such an activity 
to the limbs, and such a pliancy to every part as 
necessarily produces those compressions, exten- 

15 sions, contortions, dilatations, and all other kinds 
of motions that are necessary for the preservation 
of such a system of tubes and glands as has been 
before mentioned. And that we might not want 
inducements to engage us in such an exercise of 

20 the body as is proper for its welfare, it is so or- 
dered that nothing valuable can be procured with- 
out it. Not to mention riches and honor, even 
food and raiment are not to be come at without 
the toil of the hands and sweat of the brows. 



THE SOUND MIND IN THE SOUND BODY. 105 

Providence furnishes materials, but expects that 
we should work them up ourselves. The earth 
must be labored before it gives its increase ; and 
when it is forced into its several products, how 
many hands must they pass through before they 5 
are tit for use ? Manufactures, trade, and agricul- 
ture naturally employ more than nineteen parts of 
the species in twenty ; and as for those who are 
not obliged to labor, by the condition in which 
they are born, they are more miserable than the 10 
rest of mankind, unless they indulge themselves 
in that voluntary labor which goes by the name 
of exercise. 

My friend Sir Roger has been an indefatigable 
man in business of this kind, and has hung sev- 15 
eral parts of his house with the trophies of his 
former labors. The walls of his great hall are 
covered with the horns of several kinds of deer 
that he has killed in the chase, which he thinks 
the most valuable furniture of his house, as they 20 
afford him frequent topics of discourse, and show 
that he has not been idle. At the lower end of 
the hall is a large otter's skin stuffed with hay, 
which his mother ordered to be hung up in that 



10(j SIH ROGER DE COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

manner, and the knight looks upon with great 
satisfaction, because, it seems, he was but nine 
years old when his dog killed him. A little room 
adjoining to the hall is a kind of arsenal, filled 

5 with guns of several sizes and inventions, with 
which the knight has made great havoc in the 
woods, and destroyed many thousands of pheas- 
ants, partridges, and woodcocks. His stable doors 
are patched with noses that belonged to foxes of 

10 the knight's own hunting down. Sir Roger 
showed me one of them that, for distinction sake, 
has a brass nail struck through it, which cost him 
about fifteen hours' riding, carried him through 
half a dozen counties, killed him a brace of geld- 

15 ings, and lost above half his dogs. This the 
knight looks upon as one of the greatest exploits 
of his life. The perverse widow, whom I have 
given some account of, was the death of several 
foxes ; for Sir Roger has told me that in the 

20 course of his amours he patched the western door 
of his stable. Whenever the widow was cruel, 
the foxes were sure to pay for it. In proportion 
as his passion for the widow abated, and old age 
came on, he left his fox-hunting : but a hare is 



THE SOUND MIND IN THE SOUND BODY. 107 

not yet safe that sits within ten miles of his 
house. 

There is no kind of exercise which I would so 
recommend to my readers of both sexes as this of 
riding, as there is none which so much conduces 5 
to health, and is every way accommodated to the 
body, accordhig to the idea which I have given of 
it. Doctor Sydenham is very lavish in its praises ; 
and if the English reader would see the mechani- 
cal eifects of it described at lengtli, he may find 10 
them in a book published not many years since, 
under the title of tlie Medicina Gymnastica. For 
my own part, when I am in town, for want of 
these opportunities, I exercise myself an hour 
every morning upon a dumb-bell that is placed in 15 
a corner of my room, and pleases me the more 
because it does everything I require of it in the 
most profound silence. My landlady and her 
daughters are so well acquainted with my hours 
of exercise, that they never come into my room to 20 
disturb me whilst I am ringing. 

When I was some years 3"ounger than T am at 
present, I used to employ myself in a more la})()ri- 
ous diversion, which I learned from a Latin treatise 



108 tilR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

of exercises, that is written with great erudition ; 
it is there called the a-KLOfxaxta, or the fighting with 
a man's own shadow ; and consists in the brandish- 
ing of two short sticks grasped in each hand, and 

5 headed with plugs of lead at either end. This 
opens the chest, exercises the limbs, and gives a 
man all the pleasure of boxing, without the blows. 
I could wish that several learned men would lay 
out that time which they employ in controversies 

10 and disputes about nothing, in this method of 
fighting with their own shadows. It might con- 
duce very much to evaporate the spleen, which 
makes them uneasy to the public as well as to 
themselves. 

15 To conclude, as I am a compound of soul and 
body, I consider myself as obliged to a double 
scheme of duties : and I think I have not fulfilled 
the business of the day, when I do not thus em- 
ploy the one in labor and exercise, as well as the 

20 other in study and contemplation. L. 



THE COVERLEY HUNT. 109 



THE COVERLEY HUNT. 
No. 116. 

Friday, July 13, 1711. 

Vocat ingenti clamore Cithaeroii, 

Taygetique canes. 

ViRG. Georg. iii. 43. • 

Those who have searched into human nature 
observe that nothing so much shows the nobleness 
of the soul, as that its felicity consists in action. 
Every man has such an active principle in him 
that he will find out something to employ himself 
upon in whatever place or state of life he is 
posted. I have heard of a gentleman who was 
under close confinement in the Bastile seven 
years ; during which time he amused himself in 
scattering a few small pins about his chamber, 
gathering them up again, and placing them in 
different figures on the arm of a great chair. He 
often told his friends afterwards that unless he 



10 



110 ^SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

had found out this piece of exercise, he verily 
believed he should have lost his senses. 

After what has been said, I need not inform 
my readers, that Sir Roger, with whose chai'acter 

5 I hope they are at present pretty well acquainted, 
has in his youth gone through the whole course of 
those rural diversions which the country abounds 
in ; and which seem to be extremely well suited 
to that laborious industry a man may observe 

10 here in a far greater degree than in towns and 
cities. I have before hinted at some of my 
friend's exploits : he has in youthful days taken 
forty coveys of partridges in a season ; and tired 
many a salmon with a line consisting but of a 

15 single hair. The constant thanks and good 
wishes of the neighborhood always attended him, 
on account of his remarkable enmity towards 
foxes ; having destroyed more of those vermin in 
one year, than it was thought the whole country 

20 could have produced. Indeed the knight does 
not scruple to own, among his most intimate 
friends, that in order to establish his reputation 
this way, he had secretly sent for great numbers 
of them out of other counties, which he used to 



THE COVERLET HUN'T. Ill 

turn loose about the country by night, that he 
might the better signalize himself in their destruc- 
tion the next clay. His hunting horses were the 
finest and best managed in all these parts ; his 
tenants are still full of the praises of a gray stone- 5 
horee that unhappily staked himself several years 
since, and Avas buried with great solemnity in the 
orchard. 

Sir Roger, being at present too old for fox 
hunting, to keep himself in action, has disposed 10 
of his beagles and got a pack of stop hounds. 
What these want in speed, he endeavors to make 
amends for by the deepness of their mouths and 
the variety of their notes, which are suited in 
such manner to each other that the whole cry 15 
makes up a complete consort. He is so nice in 
this particular that a gentleman having made him 
a present of a very fine hound the other day, the 
knight returned it by the servant with a great 
many expressions of civility ; but desired him to 20 
tell his master that the dog he had sent was, 
indeed, a most excellent bass, but that at present 
he only wanted a counter-tenor. Could I believe 
my friend had ever read Shakespeare, I should 



112 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

certainly conclude he had taken the hint from 
Theseus in the Midsummer Nighfs Dream. 

My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind, 
So flu'd, so sanded ; and their heads are lumg 
5 With ears that sweep away the morning dew. 

Crook-kneed and dew-lap'd like Thessalian bulls ; 
Slow in pursuit, but matched in mouths like bells, 
Each under each : a cry more tunaljle 
Was never holla'd to, nor cheered Avith horn. 

10 Sir Roger is so keen at this sport, that he has 
been out almost every day since I came down ; 
and upon the chaplain's offering to lend me his 
easy pad, I was prevailed on yesterday morning 
to make one of the company. I was extremely 

15 pleased, as we rid along, to observe the general 
benevolence of all the neighborhood towards my 
friend. The farmers' sons thought themselves 
happy if they could open a gate for the good old 
knight as he passed by ; which he generally 

20 requited with a nod or a smile, and a kind inquiry 
after their fathers and uncles. 

After we had rid about a mile from home, we 
came upon a large heath, and the sportsmen 
began to beat. They had done so for some time. 



THE COVEULEY HUNT. 113 

wlieii, as I was a little distance from the rest of 
the company, 1 saw a hare pop out from a small 
furze-brake almost under my hoi'se's feet. I 
marked the way she took, which 1 endeavored to 
make the company sensible of by extending my 5 
arm ; but to no purpose, until Sir Roger, who 
knows that none of my extraordinary motions are 
insignificant, rode up to me, and asked me if 2)uss 
was gone that way? Upon my answering " Yes," 
he innnediately called in the dogs, and put them 10 
upon the scent. As they were going off, I heard 
one of the country-fellows muttering to his com- 
panion that it was a wonder they had not lost all 
their sport, for want of the silent gentleman's 
crying, " Stole away." This, with my aversion to 15 
leaping hedges, made me withdraw to a rising 
ground, from whence I could have the picture of 
the whole chase, without the fatigue of keeping in 
with the hounds. The hare immediately threw 
them about a mile behind her ; but 1 was pleased 20 
to find, that instead of running straight forwards, 
or in hunter's language, " flying the country," as 
I was afraid she might have done, she wheeled 
about, and described a sort of circle round the 



114 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

hill where 1 had taken my station, in such manner 
as gave me a very distinct view of the sport. 1 
could see her first pass by, and the dogs some time 
afterwards unravelling the whole track she had 

5 made, and following her through all her doubles. 
I was at the same time delighted in observing 
that deference which the rest of the pack paid to 
each particular hound, according to the character 
he had acquired amongst them : if they were at 

10 fault, and an old hound of reputation opened but 
once, he was immediately followed by the whole 
cry ; while a raw dog or one who was a noted liar, 
might have yelped his heart out, without being 
taken notice of. 

1.5 The hare now, after having squatted two or 
three times, and been put up again as often, came 
still nearer to the place where she was at first 
started. The dogs pursued her, and these were 
followed by the jolly knight, who rode upon a 

20 white gelding, encompassed by his tenants and 
servants, and cheering his hounds with all the 
gaiety of five and twenty. One of the sportsmen 
rode up to me, and told me that he was sure the 
chase was almost at an end, because the old dogs, 



THE COVERLEY HUNT. 115 

which had hitherto lain behind, now headed the 
pack. The fellow was in the right. Our hare 
took a large field just under us, followed by the 
full cry " In view." I must confess the bright- 
ness of the weather, the cheerfulness of every- 5 
thing around me, the chiding of the hounds, which 
was returned upon us in a double echo, from two 
neighboring hills, with the hallooing of the 
sportsmen, and the sounding of the horn, lifted 
my spirits into a most Hvely pleasure, which I lo 
freely indulged because I was sure it was innocent. 
If I was under any concern, it was on account of 
the poor hare, that was now quite spent, and 
almost within the reach of her enemies ; when the 
huntsman, getting forward, threw down liis pole 15 
before the dogs. They were now within eight 
yards of that game which they had been pursuing 
for almost as many hours ; yet on the signal 
before-mentioned they all made a sudden stand, 
and though they continued opening as much as 20 
before, durst not once attempt to pass beyond the 
pole. At the same time Sir Roger rode forward, 
and alighting, took up the hare in his arms; 
which he soon delivered up to one of his servants 



116 SIE ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

^Yith an order, if she could be kept alive, to let 
her go in his great orchard; where it seems he 
has several of these prisoners of war, who live 
together in a very comfortable captivity. 1 was 

5 highly pleased to see the discipline of the pack, 
and the good nature of the knight, who could not 
find in his heart to murder a creature that had 
given him so much diversion. 

As we were returning home, I remembered tliat 

10 Monsieur Paschal in his most excellent discourse 
on the Misery of Man tells us that all our en- 
deavors after greatness proceed from notliing but 
a desire of being surrounded by a multitude of 
pei*sons and affairs that may hinder us from look- 

15 ing into ourselves, which is a view we cannot 
bear. He afterwards goes on to show that our 
love of sports comes from the same reason, and is 
particularly severe upon hunting. " What," says 
he, " unless it be to drown thought, can make men 

20 throw away so much time and pains upon a silly 
animal, which they might buy cheaper in the mar- 
ket?" The foregoing reflection is certainly just 
when a man suffers his whole mind to be drawn 
into his sports, and altogether loses himself in the 



THE COVE RLE Y HUNT. 117 

woods ; but does not affect those who propose a 
far more laudable end from this exercise, 1 mean 
the preservation of health, and keeping all the 
organs of the soul in a condition to execute her 
orders. Had that incomparable person, whom 1 5 
last quoted, been a little more indulgent to himself 
in this point, the world might probably have 
enjoyed him much longer ; whereas, tlirough too 
great an application to his studies in his youth, he 
contracted that ill habit of the body, which, after lo 
a tedious sickness, carried him oft' in the fortieth 
year of his age ; and the whole history we have of 
his life till that time is but one continued account 
of the behavior of a noble soul struggling under 
innumerable pains and distempers. 15 

For my own part, I intend to hunt twice a 
week during my stay with Sir Roger, and shall 
prescribe the moderate use of this exercise to all 
my country friends, as the best kind of physic for 
mending a bad constitution and preserving a good 20 
one. 

I cannot do this better than in the following 
lines out of Mr. Dryden : 



118 .s;/t' ROGER DE COVEllLEY PAPERS. 

The tirst pliysieians by debauch were nuule ; 

Excess bciian, and sloth sustains the trade. 

By chase our long-lived fatliers earned their food ; 

Toil strung the nerves, and puritied the blood ; 
5 But we their sons, a pamperM race of men. 

Are dwindled down to threescore years and ten. 

Better to hunt in fields for health unbought 

Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught. 

The wise for cure on exercise depend : 
10 God never made his work for man to mend. 

X. 



THE COVEKLEY WITCH. 119 



THE COVERLEY WIT(^H. 
No. 117. 



Saturday, Jiili/ 14, 1711. 

-Ipsi sibi somnia tiiif^unt. 

ViKxi. Eel. viii. 109. 



There are some opinions in which a man 
should stand neuter, without engaging his assent 
to one side or the other. Such a hovering faith 
as this, which refuses to settle upon any determi- 
nation, is absolutely necessary to a mind that is 5 
careful to avoid errors and prepossessions. When 
the arguments press equally on both sides in mat- 
ters that are indifferent to us, the safest method is 
to give up ourselves to neither. 

It is with this temper of mind that I consider lo 
the subject of witchcraft. When 1 hear the rela- 
tions that are made from all parts of the world, 
not only from Norway and Lapland, from the East 
and West Indies, but from every particular na- 



120 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

tion in Europe, I cannot forbear thinking that 
there is such an intercourse and commerce with 
evil spirits as that wliich we express by the name 
of witchcraft. But when I consider that tlie igno- 

5 rant and credulous parts of the world abound 
most in these relations, and that the persons 
among us who are supposed to engage in such an 
infernal commerce are people of a weak under- 
standing and a crazed imagination, and at the same 

10 time reflect upon the many impostures and delu- 
sions of this nature that have been detected in 
all ages, 1 endeavor to suspend my belief till 1 
hear more certain accounts than any which have 
yet come to my knowledge. In short, when I con- 

15 sider the question, whether there are such persons 
in the world as those we call witches, my mind is 
divided between the two opposite opinions ; or 
rather (to speak my thoughts freely) I believe in 
general that there is, and has been, such a thing 

20 as witchcraft ; but at the same time can give no 
credit to any particular instance of it. 

I am engaged in this speculation by some oc- 
currences that I met with yesterday, which I shall 
give my reader an account of at large. As I was 



THE COVEHLEY WITCH. 121 

walking with my friend Sir Roger, by the side of 
one of his woods, an old woman appUed herself to 
me for my charity. Her dress and figure put me 
in mind of the following description in Otway : 

In a close lane, as I pursird my journey, 5 

I spyM a ^vrinkled hag, with age grown double, 
Picking dry sticks, and mumbling to herself. 
Her eyes with scalding rheum were gallVl and red ; 
Cold ])alsy shook her head ; her Jiands seemVl withered 
And on her crooked shoulders had she wrappVl 10 

The tatterM remnants of an old strip'd hanging. 
Which servVl to keep her carcass from the cold, 
So there was nothing of a piece about her. 
Her lower weeds were all o'er coarsely patch 'd 
With different colourVl rags, black, red, white, yellow, 15 
And seem'd to speak variety of wretchedness. 

As I was musing on this description, and com- 
paring it with the object before me, the knight 
told me that this very old woman had the reputa- 
tion of a witch all over the country, that her lips 20 
were observed to be always in motion, and that 
there was not a switch about her house which her 
neighbors did not believe had carried her several 
hundreds of miles. If she chanced to stumble, 
they always found sticks or straws that lay in the 25 



122 sin ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

figure of a cross before lier. If she made any 
mistake at church, and cried Amen in a wrong 
place, they never failed to conclude that she was 
saying her prayers backwards. There was not a 

5 maid in the parish that would take a pin of her, 
though she should offer a bag of money with it. 
She goes by the name of Moll White, and has 
made the country ring with several imaginary 
exploits which are palmed upon her. If the 

10 dairy-maid does not make her butter to come so 
soon as she would have it, Moll White is at the 
bottom of the churn. If a horse sweats in the 
stable, Moll White has been upon his back. If a 
hare makes an unexpected escape from the 

15 hounds, tlie huntsman curses Moll White. 
" Nay," says Sir Roger, " I have known the mas- 
ter of the pack, upon such an occasion, send one 
of his servants to see if Moll White had been out 
that morning." 

20 This account raised my curiosity so far that I 
begged my friend Sir Roger to go Avith me into 
her hovel, which stood in a solitar}^ corner under 
the side of the wood. Upon our first entering, 
Sir Roger winked to me, and pointed at some- 



THE COVERLEY WITCH. 123 

thing that stood behind the door, which, upon 
looking that way, I found to be an old broom-staff. 
At the same time he whispered me in the ear, to 
take notice of a tabby cat that sat in the chimney- 
corner, which, as the knight told me, lay under as 5 
bad a report as Moll White herself ; for besides 
that Moll is said often to accompany her in the 
same shape, the cat is reported to have spoken 
twice or thrice in her life, and to have played sev- 
eral pranks above the capacity of an ordinary cat. lo 

I was secretly concerned to see human nature 
in so much wretchedness and disgrace, but at the 
same time could not forbear smilinof to hear Sir 
Roger, who is a little puzzled about the old 
woman, advising her, as a justice of peace, to 15 
avoid all communication with the Devil, and 
never to hurt any of her neighbors' cattle. We 
concluded our visit with a bounty, which was 
very acceptable. 

In our return home. Sir Roger told me that old 20 
Moll had been often brought before him for mak- 
ing children spit pins, and giving maids the night- 
mare ; and that the country people would be toss- 
ing her into a pond, and trying experiments with 



124 SIR ROGER 1)E COVEULEY PAPERS, 

her every day, if it was not for him and his chap- 
lain. 

I have since found, upon inquiry, that Sir 
Roger was several times staggered with the re- 

5 ports that had been brought him concerning this 

old woman, and would frequently have bound her 

over to the county sessions, had not his chaplain 

with much ado persuaded him to the contrary. 

I have been tlie more particular in this account, 

10 because I hear that there is scarce a village in 
England that has not a Moil White in it. When 
an old woman begins to dote, and grow chargeable 
to a palish, she is generally turned into a witch 
and tills the whole country with extravagaiit 

15 fancies, imaginary distempers, and terrify ii g 
dreams. In the mean time the poor wretch tli; t 
is the innocent occasion of so many evils, begii s 
to be frighted at herself, and sometimes confessc s 
secret commerces and familiarities that her imagi- 

20 nation forms in a delirious old age. This frequently 
cuts off charity from the greatest objects of com- 
passion, and inspires people with a malevolence 
towards those poor decrepit parts of our species, 
in whom human nature is defaced by inlirmity 

25 and dotage. L. 



TOWN AND COUNTRY MANNERS. 125 



TOWN AND COUNTRY MANNERS. 
No. 119. 

July 17, 1711. 

Urbem quam dicunt Romam, Meliboee, putavi 

Stultus ego huic nostras similem 

ViKG. Eel. i. 20. 

The first and most obvious reflections wliicli 
arise in a man who changes the city for the 
country, are upon the different manners of the 
people whom he meets with in those two different 
scenes of life. By manners I do not mean morals, 5 
l)ut behavior and good-breeding, as they show 
themselves in the town and in the country. 

And here, in the first place, I must observe a 
very great revolution that has happened in this 
article of good-breeding. Several obliging defer- 10 
ences, condescensions, and submissions, with many 
outward forms and ceremonies that accompany 
them, were first of all brought up among the 
politer part of mankind, who lived in courts 



126 sin ROGER BE COVEHLEY PAPERS. 

and cities, and distinguished themselves from the 
rustic part of the species (who on all occasions 
acted bluntly and naturally) by such a mutual 
complaisance and intercourse of civilities. These 

5 forms of conversation by degrees multiplied, and 
grew troublesome ; the modish world found too 
great a constraint in them, and have therefore 
thrown most of them aside. Conversation was so 
encumbered with show" and ceremony that it 

10 stood in need of a reformation to retrench its 
superfluities, and restore it to its natural good 
sense and beauty. At present, therefore, an un- 
constrained carriage and a certain openness of 
behavior are the height of good-breeding. The 

15 fashionable world is grown free and easy ; our 
maimers sit more loose upon us : nothing is so 
modish as an agreeable negligence. In a word, 
good-breeding shows most, Avhere to an ordinary 
eye it appears the least. 

20 If after this we look on the people of mode in 
the country, we find in them the manners of the 
last age. They have no sooner fetched them- 
selves up to the fashion of the [)olite w^orld, but 
the town has dropped them, and are nearer to the 



TOWN AND COUNTRY MANNELIS. 127 

first state of nature, than to those refinements 
wliich formerly reigned in the court, and still 
prevail in the country. One may now know a 
man that never conversed in the world, by his 
excess of good-breeding. A polite country squire 5 
shall make you as many bows in half an hour as 
would serve a courtier for a week. There is in- 
finitely more to do about place and precedency 
in a meeting of justices' wives, than in an assem- 
bly of duchesses. 10 

This rural politeness is very troublesome to a 
man of my temper, who generally take the chair 
that is next me, and walk first or last, in the front 
or in the rear, as chance directs. I have known 
my friend Sir Roger's dinner almost cold before 15 
the company could adjust the ceremonial, and be 
prevailed upon to sit down ; and have heartily 
pitied my old friend, when I have seen him forced 
to pick and cull his guests, as they sat at the 
several parts of his table, that he might drink 20 
their healths according to their respective ranks 
and qualities. Honest Will Wimble, who I should 
have thought had been altogether uninfected Avith 
ceremony, gives me abundance of trouble in this 



128 SIR ROGER DE COVER LEY PAPERS. 

particular. Though he has been fishing all the 
morning, he will not help himself at dinner till I 
am served. When we are going out of the hall, 
he runs behind me ; and last night, as we were 

5 walking in the fields, stopped short at a stile till 
I came up to it, and upon my making signs to him 
to get over, told me, with a serious smile, that 
sure I believed they had no manners in the 
country. 

10 There has happened another revolution in the 
point of good-breeding, which relates to the con- 
versation among men of mode, and which I cannot 
but look upon as very extraordinary. It was cer- 
tainly one of the first distinctions of a well-bred 

15 man, to express every thing that had the most 
remote appearance of being obscene, in modest 
terms and distant phrases, whilst the clown, Avho 
had no such delicacy of conception and expres- 
sion, clothed his ideas in those plain, homely terms 

20 that are the most obvious and natural. This kind 
of good manners Avas perhaps carried to an excess, 
so as to make conversation too stiff, formal, and 
precise ; for which reason (as hypocrisy in one age 
is generally succeeded by atheism in another) 



TOWN AND COUNTRY MANNERS. 129 

conversation is in a great measure relapsed into 
the first extreme ; so that at present several of 
our men of the town, and particularly those w^ho 
have been polished in France, make use of the 
most coarse uncivilizfed words in our language, 5 
and utter themselves often in such a manner as a 
clown would blush to hear. 

This infamous piece of good-breeding, which 
reigns among the coxcombs of the town, has not 
yet made its way into the country ; and as it is 10 
impossible for such an irrational way of conversa- 
tion to last long among a people that make any 
profession of religion, or show of modesty, if the 
country gentlemen get into it, they will certainly 
be left in the lurch. Their good-breeding will 15 
come too late to them, and they will be thought a 
parcel of lewd clowns, while they fancy them- 
selves talking together like men of wit and 
pleasure. 

As the two points of good-breeding which I 20 
have hitherto insisted upon regard behavior and 
conversation, there is a third which turns upon 
dress. In this too the country are very much 
behind-hand. The rural beaus are not yet got 



130 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

out of the fashion that took place at the time of 
the Revolution, but ride about the country in red 
coats and hiced hats ; while the women in many 
parts are still trying to outvie one another in the 

5 height of their head-dresses. 

But a friend of mine, who is now upon the 
western circuit, having promised to give me an 
account of the several modes and fashions that 
prevail in the different parts of the nation through 

10 which he passes, I shall defer the enlarging upon 
this last topic till I have received a letter from 
him, which I expect every post. L. 



THE COVERLEY POULTRY. 131 



THE COVERLEY POULTRY. 
No. 120. 

Wednesday, July 18, 1711. 
Equideni credo quia sit divinitus illis 



Ingeiiium 

VliKJ. Georg. i. 415. 

My friend Sir Roger is very often merry with 
nie, upon my passing so much of my time among 
his poultry: lie has caught me twice or thrice 
looking after a bird's nest, and several times sit- 
ting an hour or two together near an hen and 5 
chickens. He tells me he believes I am personally 
ac(]^uainted with every fowl about his house ; calls 
such a particular cock my favorite, and frequently 
complains that his ducks and geese have more of 
my company than himself. 10 

I must confess I am infniitely delighted with 
those speculations of nature which are to be made 
in a country life ; and as my reading has very 



132 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

much lain among books of natural history, 1 can- 
not forbear recollecting upon this occasion the 
several remarks wliich I have met with in authors, 
and comparing them with what falls under my 

5 own observation: the arguments for Providence 
drawn from the natural history of animals being 
in my opinion demonstrative. 

The make of every kind of animal is different 
from that of every other kind ; and yet there is 

10 not the least turn in the muscles or twist in the 
fibres of any one, which does not render them more 
proper for that particular animal's way of life, than 
any other cast or texture of them would have 
been. 

15 It is astonishing to consider the different de- 
grees of care that descend from the parent to the 
young, so far as is absolutely necessary for the 
leaving a posterity. Some creatures cast their 
eggs as chance directs them, and think of them no 

20 farther, as insects and several kinds of fish : others, 
of a nicer frame, find out proper beds to deposit 
them in, and there leave them ; as the serpent, the 
crocodile, and ostrich : others hatch their eggs and 
tend the birth till it is able to shift for itself. 



THE COVERLEY POULTRY. 133 

What can we call the principle which directs 
every different kind of bird to observe a particular 
plan in the structure of its nest, and directs all of 
the same species to work after the same model? 
It cannot be imitation ; for though you hatch a 5 
crow under a hen, and never let it see any of the 
works of its own kind, the nest it makes shall be 
the same, to the laying of a stick, with all the 
other nests of the same species. It cannot be 
reason; for were animals endued with it to as 10 
great a degree as man, their buildings would be 
as different as ours, according to the different con- 
veniences that they would propose to themselves. 

Is it not remarkable that the same temper of 
weather which i-aises this genial warmth in ani- 15 
mals, should cover the trees with leaves and the 
fields with grass, for their security and conceal- 
ment, and produce such infinite swarms of insects 
for the support and sustenance of their respective 
broods ? 20 

Is it not wonderful that the love of the parent 
should be so violent while it lasts ; and that it 
should last no longer than is necessary for the 
preservation of the young ? 



134 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

But notwitlistciiiding this natural love in brutes 
is much more violent and intense than in rational 
creatures, Providence has taken care that it should 
be no longer troublesome to the parent than it is 

5 useful to the young ; for so soon as the wants of 
the latter cease, the mother withdraws her fond- 
ness, and leaves them to provide for themselves : 
and what is a very remarkable circumstance in 
this part of instinct, we find that the love of the 

10 parent may be lengthened out beyond its usual 

. time, if the preservation of the species requires it ; 
as we may see in birds that drive away their young 
as soon as they are able to get their livelihood, but 
continue to feed them if they are tied to the nest, 

15 or confined mthin a cage, or by any other jneans 
appear to be out of a condition of supplying their 
own necessities. 

This natural love is not observed in animals to 
ascend from the young to the parent, which is not 

20 at all necessary for the continuance of the species : 
nor, indeed, in reasonable creatures does it rise in 
any proportion, as it spreads itself downwards ; 
for in all family affection, we find protection 
granted and favors bestowed are greater motives 



TFIE COVERLET POULTRY. 135 

to love and tenderness, than safety, benefits, or 
life received. 

One would wonder to hear sceptical men dis- 
puting for the reason of animals, and telling us it 
is only our pride and prejudices that will not 5 
allow them the use of that faculty. 

Reason shows itself in all occurrences of life; 
whereas the brute makes no discovery of such a 
talent, but in what immediately regards his own 
preservation, or the continuance of his species. 10 
Animals in their generation are wiser than the 
sons of men; but their wisdom is confined to a 
few particulars, and lies in a very narrow compass. 
Take a brute out of his instinct, and you find him 
wholly deprived of understanding. To use an in- 15 
stance that comes often under observation. 

With what caution does the hen provide herself 
a nest in places unfrequented, and free from noise 
and disturbance ! When she has laid her eggs in 
such a manner that she can cover them, what care 20 
does she take in turning them frequently, that all 
parts may partake of the vital warmth ! When 
she leaves them to provide for her necessary sus- 
tenance, how punctually does she return before 



13(3 SIR ROGER 1)E COVERLEY PAPERS. 

they have time to cool, and l)ecome incapable of 
producing an animal I In the summer you see her 
giving herself greater freedoms, and quitting her 
care for above two hours together ; but in winter, 

5 when the rigor of the season would chill the prin- 
ciples of life, and destroy the young one, she 
grows more assiduous in her attendance, and 
stays away but half the time. When the birth 
approaches, with how much nicety and attention 

10 does she help the chick to break its prison ! Not 
to take notice of her covering it from the injuries 
of the weather, providing it proper nourishment, 
and teaching it to help itself ; nor to mention her 
forsaking the nest, if after the usual time of reckon- 

15 ing the young one does not made its appearance. 
A chemical operation could not be followed with 
greater art or diligence, than is seen in the hatch- 
ing of a chick ; though there are many other birds 
that show an infinitely greater sagacity in all the 

20 forementioned particulars. 

But at the same time the hen, that has all this 
seeming ingenuity, (which is indeed absolutely 
necessary for the propagation of the species) 
considered in other respects, is without the least 



THK COVEELEY POULTRY. 137 

glimmerings of thouglit or common sense. She 
mistakes a piece of chalk for an egg, and sits upon 
it in the same manner ; she is insensible of any 
increase or diminution in the number of those she 
lays: she does not distinguish between her own 5 
and those of another species ; and when the birth 
appears of never so different a bird, will cherish it 
for her own. In all these circumstances, which do 
not carry an immediate regard to the subsistence 
of herself or her species, she is a very idiot. 10 

There is not in my opinion anything more mys- 
terious in nature than this instinct in animals, 
which thus rises above reason, and falls infinitely 
short of it. It cannot be accounted for by any 
properties in matter, and at the same time works 15 
after so odd a manner, that one cannot think it 
the faculty of an intellectual being. For my own 
part, I look upon it as upon the principle of gravi- 
tation in bodies, which is not to be explained by 
any known qualities inherent in the bodies them- 20 
selves, nor from any laws of mechanism, but, ac- 
cording to the best notions of the greatest philoso- 
phers, is an immediate impression from the first 
mover, and the divine energy acting in the crea- 
tures. L. 25 



188 StE ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



THE COVERLEY POULTRY. 
No. 121. 

Thursday, July 19, 1711. 

Jovis omnia plena. 

ViRG. Eel. iii. 60. 

As I was walking this morning in the great 
yard that belongs to my friend's country-house, I 
was wonderfully pleased to see the different work- 
ings of instinct in a hen followed by a brood of 

5 ducks. The young, upon the sight of a pond, 
immediately ran into it ; while the step-mother, 
with all imaginable anxiety, hovered about the bor- 
ders of it, to call them out of an element that 
appeared to her so dangerous and destructive. As 

10 the different principle which acted in these differ- 
ent animals cannot be termed reason, so when we 
call it instinct, we mean something we have no 
knowledge of. To me, as I hinted in my last 
paper, it seems the immediate direction of Provi- 



THE COVEllLEY POULTRY. 139 

dence, and such an operation of the Supreme 
Being as that which determines all the portions 
of matter to their proper centres. A modern 
philosopher, quoted by Monsieur Bayle in his 
learned dissertation on the souls of brutes, delivers 5 
the same opinion, though in a bolder form of 
words, where he says, Devs est anima hrutorum : 
' God himself is the soul of brutes.' Who can 
tell what to call that seeming sagacity in animals, 
which directs them to such food as is proper for 10 
tliem, and makes them naturally avoid whatever is 
noxious or unwholesome? Dampier in his Travels 
tells us that when seamen are thrown upon any of 
tlie unknown coasts of America, they never ven- 
ture upon the fruit of any tree, how tempting so- 15 
ever it may appear, unless they observe that it is 
marked with the pecking of birds; but fall on 
without any fear or apprehension where the birds 
liave been before them. 

But notwithstanding animals have nothing like 20 
the use of reason, we find in them all the lower 
parts of our nature, the passions and senses in 
their greatest strength and perfection. And liere 
it is worth our observation, that all beasts and 



140 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

birds of prey are wonderfully subject to anger, 
malice, revenge, and all other violent passions that 
may animate them in search of their proper food ; 
as those that are incapable of defending them- 

5 selves, or annoying others, or whose safety lies 
chiefly in their flight, are suspicious, fearful, and 
apprehensive of everything they see or hear : whilst 
others, that are of assistance and use to man, have 
their natures softened with something mild and 

10 tractable, and by that means are qualified for a 
domestic life. In this case the passions generally 
correspond Avith the make of the body. ^ We do 
not find the fury of a lion in so weak and de- 
fenceless an animal as a lamb, nor the meek- 

15 ness of a lamb in a creature so armed for battle 
and assault as the lion. In the same manner, 
we find that particular animals have a more or 
less exquisite sharpness and sagacity in those 
particular senses which most turn to their advan- 

20 tage, and in which their safety and welfare is the 
most concerned. 

Nor must we here omit that great variety of 
arms with which nature has differently fortified 
the bodies of several kinds of animals, such as 



THE COVERLET POULTRY. 141 

claws, hoofs and horns, teeth and tusks, a tail, a 
sting, a trunk, or a proboscis. It is likewise 
observed by naturalists, that it must be some hid- 
den principle, distinct from what we call reason, 
which instructs animals in the use of these their 5 
arms, and teaches them to manage them to the 
best advantage ; because they naturally defend 
themselves with that part in whicli their strength 
lies, before the weapon be formed in it ; as is re- 
markable in lambs, which, though they are bred lo 
within doors, and never saw the actions of their 
own species, push at those who approach them, 
with their foreheads, before the first budding of a 
— 4iorn appears. 

I shall add to these general observations, an 15 
instance which Mr. Locke has given us of Provi- 
dence, even in the imperfections of a creature 
which seems the meanest and most despicable in 
the whole animal world. " We may," says he, 
"■ from the make of an oyster or cockle, conclude 20 
that it has not so many nor so quick senses as a 
man, or several other animals : nor, if it had, 
would it in that state and incapacity of trans- 
ferring itself from one place to another, be bettered 



142 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

by them. What good would sight and hearing do 
to a creature that cannot move itself to or from 
the object, wherein at a distance it perceives good 
or evil ? And would not quickness of sensation 

5 be an inconvenience to an animal that must be 
still where chance has once placed it; and there 
receive the afflux of colder or warmer, clean or 
foul water, as it happens to come to it ? " 

I shall add to this instance out of Mr. Locke, 

10 another out of the learned Dr. More, who cites it 
from Cardan, in relation to another animal which 
Providence has left defective, but at the same 
time has shown its wisdom in the formation of 
that organ in which it seems chiefly to have 

15 failed. " What is more obvious and ordinary than 
a mole ; and yet what more palpable argument of 
Providence than she? The members of her body 
are so exactly fitted to her nature and manner of 
life ; for her dwelling being under ground, where 

20 nothing is to be seen, nature has so obscurely fitted 
her with eyes that naturalists can scarce agree 
whether she have au}^ sight at all or no. But, for 
amends, what she is capable of for her defence 
and warning of danger, she has very eminently 



THE COVERLET POULTRY. 143 

conferred upon her ; for she is exceedingly quick 
of hearing. And then her short tail and short 
legs, but broad fore-feet, armed with sharp claws, 
we see by the event to what purpose they are, she 
so swiftly working herself under ground, and mak- 5 
ing her way so fast in the earth, as they that be- 
hold it cannot but admire it. Her legs therefore 
are short, that she need dig no more than will 
serve the mere thickness of her body ; and her 
fore-feet are broad, that she may scoop away much 10 
earth at a time ; and little or no tail she has, 
because she courses it not on the ground, like the 
rat or mouse, of whose kindred she is, but lives 
under the earth, and is fain to dig herself a dwell- 
ing there. And she making her way through so 15 
thick an element, which will not yield easily, as 
the air or the water, it had been dangerous to 
have drawn so long a train behind her ; for her 
enemy might fall upon her rear, and fetch her out 
before she had completed or got full possession of 20 
her works." 

I cannot forbear mentioning Mr. Boyle's remark 
upon this last creature, who, I remember, some- 
where in his works observes, that though the mole 



144 SIR ROGER I)E COYERLEY PAPERS. 

be not totally blind (as it is commonly thought) 
she has not sight enough to distinguish particular 
objects. Her eye is said to have but one humor 
in it, which is supposed to give her the idea of 

5 light, but of nothing else, and is so formed that 
this idea is probably painful to the animal. When- 
ever she comes up into broad day she might be in 
danger of being taken, unless she were thus 
affected by a light striking upon her eye, and 

10 immediately warning her to bury herself in her 
proper element. More sight would be useless to 
her, as none at all might be fatal. 

1 have only instanced such animals as seem the 
most imperfect works of nature ; and if Providence 

15 shows itself even in the blemishes of these crea- 
tures, how much more does it discover itself in 
the several endowments which it has variously 
bestowed upon such creatures as are more or less 
finished and completed in their several faculties, 

20 according to the condition of life in which they 
are posted ! 

I could wish our Royal Society would compile a 
body of natural history, the best that could be 
gathered together from books and observations. 



THE COYERLEY POULTRY. 145 

If the several Avriters among them took each his 
particular species, and gave us a distinct account 
of its original birth and education ; its policies, 
hostilities and alliances, with the frame and tex- 
ture of its inward and outward parts, and particu- 5 
larly those that distinguish it from all other ani- 
mals, with their peculiar aptitude for the state of 
being in which Providence has placed them, it 
would be one of the best services their studies 
could do mankind, and not a little redound to the 10 
glory of the all- wise Contriver. 

It is true, such a natural history, after all the 
disquisitions of the learned, would be infinitely 
short and defective. Seas and deserts hide mil- 
lions of animals from our observation. Innumer- 15 
able artifices and stratagems are acted in the 
lioivlinif tvilderness and in the great deep, that can 
never come to our knowledge. Besides that there 
are infinitely more species of creatures which are 
not to be seen without, nor indeed with the help 20 
of the finest glasses, than of such as are bulky 
enough for the naked eye to take hold of. How- 
ever, from the consideration of such animals as lie 
within the compass of our knowledge, we might 



146 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

easily form a conclusion of the rest, that the same 
variety of wisdom and goodness runs through the 
whole creation, and puts every creature in a con- 
dition to provide for its safety and subsistence in 
its proper station. L. 



SIR ROGER JUDICIAL. 147 



SIR ROGER JUDICIAL. 
No. 122. 

Friday, Juhj 20, 1711. 

Comes juciindus in via pro vehiculo est. 

Pub. Syr. Frag. 

A man's first care should be to avoid the re- 
proaches of his own heart ; his next, to escape the 
censures of the world : if the last interferes with 
the former, it ought to be entirely neglected ; but 
otherwise there cannot be a greater satisfaction to 5 
an honest mind, than to see those approbations 
which it gives itself seconded by the applauses of 
the public: a man is more sure of his conduct, 
when the verdict which he passes upon his own 
behavior is thus warranted and confirmed by the 
opinion of all that know him. 10 

My worthy friend Sir Roger is one of those 
who is not only at peace within himself, but 
beloved and esteemed by all about him. He 



148 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

receives a suitable tribute for his uuiversal benev- 
olence to mankind, in the returns of affection 
and good-will which are paid him by every one 
that lives within his neighborhood. I lately met 

5 with two or three odd instances of that general 
respect which is shown to the good old knight. 
He would needs carry Will Wimble and myself 
with him to the county-assizes: as we were upon 
the road, Will Wimble joined a couple of plain 

10 men who rid before us, and conversed with them 
for some time ; during which my friend Sir Roger 
acquainted me with their characters. 

" The first of them," says he, " that has a spaniel 
by his side, is a yeoman of about an hundred pounds 

15 a year, an honest man : he is just within the game 
act, and qualified to kill an hare or a pheasant: 
he knocks down a dinner with his gun twice or 
thrice a week ; and by that means lives much 
cheaper than those who have not so good an estate 

20 as himself. He would be a good neighbor if he 

did not destroy so many partridges : in short, he 

is a very sensible man ; shoots flying ; and has 

been several times foreman of the petty-jury. 

" The other that rides along with him is Tom 



SIR ROGER JUDICIAL. 149 

Touchy, a fellow famous for taking the law of 
every body. There is not one in the town where 
he lives that he has not sued at a quarter-sessions. 
The rogue had once the impudence to go to law 
with the widow. His head is full of costs, -5 
damages, and ejectments : he plagued a couple of 
honest gentlemen so long for a trespass in break- 
ing one of his hedges, till he was forced to sell 
the ground it enclosed to defray the charges of 
the prosecution: his father left him foui'-score 10 
pounds a year : but he has cast and been cast so 
often, that he is not now worth thirty. I suppose 
he is going upon the old business of the willow- 
tree." 

As Sir Roger was giving me this account of 15 
Tom Touchy, Will Wimble and his two com- 
panions stopped short till we came up to them. 
After having paid their respects to Sir Roger, 
Will told him that Mr. Touchy and he must 
appeal to him upon a dispute that arose between 20 
them. Will, it seems, had been giving his fellow- 
travellers an account of his angling one day in 
such a hole ; when Tom Touchy, instead of hear- 
ing out his story, told him that Mr. Such-an-one, 



150 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

if he pleased, niiglit take the law of him for fishing 
ill that part of the river. My friend Sir Roger 
heard them both, upon a round trot, and after 
having paused some time told them, with an air of 

5 a man who would not give liis judgment rashly, 
that 7nueh might be said on both sides. They were 
neither of them dissatisfied with the knight's 
determination, because neither of them found him- 
self in the wrong by it : upon which we made the 

10 best of our way to the assizes. 

The court was sat before Sir Roger came, but 
notwithstanding all the justices had taken their 
places upon the bench, they made room for the 
old knight at the head of them; who, for his 

15 reputation in the country, took occasion to whisper 
in the judge's "ear, that he was glad his lordship 
had met with so much good weather in his circuit. 
I was listening to the proceeding of the court 
with much attention, and infinitely pleased with 

20 that great appearance and solemnity which so 
properly accompanies such a public administration 
of our laws ; when, after about an hour's sitting, 
I observed, to my great surprise, in the midst of a 
trial, that my friend Sir Roger was getting up to 



SIR ROGER JUDICIAL. 151 

speak. I was in some pain for him, till I found 
he had acquitted himself of two or three sen- 
tences, with a look of much business and great 
intrepidity. 

Upon his first rising the court was hushed, and 6 
a general whisper ran among the country people 
that Sir Roger was up. The speech he made was 
so little to the purpose that I shall not trouble 
my readers with an account of it ; and I believe 
was not so much designed by the knight himself lo 
to inform the court, as to give him a figure in my 
eye, and keep up his credit in the country. 

I was highly delighted, when the court rose, to 
see the gentlemen of the country gathering about 
my old friend, and striving who should compli- 15 
ment him most ; at the same time that the ordinary 
people gazed upon him at a distance, not a little 
admiring his courage, that was not afraid to 
speak to the judge. 

In our return home we met with a very odd 20 
accident ; which I cannot forbear relating, because 
it shows how desirous all who know Sir Roger 
are of giving him marks of their esteem. When 
we were arrived upon the verge of his estate, we 



152 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

stopped at a little inn to rest ourselves and our 
horses. The man of the house had, it seems, 
been formerly a servant in the knight's family ; 
and to do honor to his old master, had some time 

5 since, unknown to Sir Roger, put him up in a sign- 
post before the door; so that The KnigMs Head 
had hung out upon the road about a week before 
he himself knew any thing of the matter. As 
soon as Sir Roger was acquainted with it, finding 

10 that his servant's indiscretion proceeded wholly 
from affection and good will, he only told him 
that he had made him too high a compliment; 
and when the fellow seemed to think that could 
hardly be, added with a more decisive look, that 

15 it was too great an honor for any man under a 
duke ; but told him at the same time, that it 
might be altered with a very few touches, and 
that he himself would be at the charge of it. 
Accordingly they got a painter by the knight's 

20 direction to add a pair of whiskers to the face, 
and by a little aggravation to the features to 
change it into Tlie Saracen's Head. I should not 
have known this story, had not the inn-keeper, 
upon Sir Roger's alighting, told him in my hear- 



SIR ROGER JUDICIAL. 15B 

ing that his honor's head was brought back last 
night, with the alterations that he had ordered to 
be made in it. Upon this, my friend, with his 
usual cheerfulness, related the particulars above- 
mentioned, and ordered the iiead to be brought 5 
into the room. I could not forbear discovering 
greater expressions of mirth than ordinary upon 
the appearance of this monstrous face, under 
which, notwithstanding it was made to frown and 
stare in the most extraordinary manner, I could 10 
still discover a distant resemblance of m}^ old 
friend. Sir Roger, upon seeing me laugh, desired 
me to tell him truly if I thought it possible for 
people to know him in that disguise. I at first 
kept my usual silence ; but upon the knight's con- 15 
juring me to tell him whether it was not still 
more like himself than a Saracen, I composed my 
countenance in the best manner I could, and 
replied that much might be said on both sides. 

These several adventures, w^ith the knight's '20 
behavior in them, gave me as pleasant a day as 
ever 1 met with in any of my travels. L. 



154 SIE ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



THE TRAINING OF AN HEIR. 

No. 123 

Saturday, July 21, 1711. 

Doctrina sed vim promovet insitam, 
Rectique cultus pectora roborant; 
Utcunque defecere mores, 
Dedecorant bene nata culpae. 

HOR. iv. Od. 4. 33. 

As I was yesterday taking the air with my 
friend Sir Roger, we were met by a fresh-colored, 
ruddy young man, who rid by us full speed, with 
a couple of servants behind liim. Upon my in- 

;") quiry who he was. Sir Roger told me that he was 
a young gentleman of a considerable estate, who 
had been educated by a tender mother that lives 
not many miles from the place where we w^ere. 
She is a very good lady, says my friend, but took 

10 so much care of her son's health, that she has 
made him good for nothing. She quickly found 
that reading was bad for his eyes, and that writ- 



THE TRAINING OF AN HEIR. 155 

ing made his head ache. He was let loose among 
the woods as soon as he was able to ride on horse- 
back, or to carry a gun upon his shoulder. To be 
brief, I found, by my friend's account of him, that 
he had got a great stock of health, but nothing 5 
else ; and that if it were a man's business only to 
live, there would not be a more accomplished 
young fellow in the whole country. 

The truth of it is, since my residing in these 
parts, I have seen and heard innumerable instances 10 
of young heirs and elder brothers, who either 
from their own reflecting upon the estates they 
are born to, and therefore thinking all other ac- 
complishments unnecessary, or from hearing these 
notions frequently inculcated to them by the flat- 15 
tery of their servants and domestics, or from the 
same foolish thoughts prevailing in those who 
have the care of their education, are of no manner 
of use but to keep up their families, and transmit 
their lands and houses in a line to posterity. 20 

This makes me often think on a story I have 
heard of two friends, which I shall give my reader 
at large, under feigned names. The moral of it 
may, I hope, be useful, though there are some 



156 SIR ROGER 1)E COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

circumstances which make it rather appear like a 
novel than a true story. 

Eudoxus and Leontine began the world with 
small estates. Tiiey were both of them men of 

5 good sense and great virtue. They prosecuted 
their studies together in their earlier years, and en- 
tered into such a friendship as lasted to the end of 
their lives. Eudoxus, at his first setting out in 
the world, threw himself into a court, where by 

10 his natural endowments and his acquired abilities 
he made his way from one post to another, till at 
length he had raised a very considerable fortune. 
Leontine, on the contrary, sought all opportu- 
nities of improving his mind by study, conversa- 

15 tion, and travel. He was not only acquainted 
with all the sciences, but with the most eminent 
professors of them throughout Europe. He 
knew perfectly well the interests of its princes, 
with tlie customs and fashions of their courts, 

20 and could scarce meet with the name of an ex- 
traordinary person in the gazette whom he had not 
either talked to or seen. In short, he had so well 
mixed and digested his knowledge of men and 
books, that he made one of the most accomplished 



THE TRAINING OF AN HEIR. 157 

persons of his age. During the whole course of 
his studies and travels he kept up a punctual cor- 
respondence with Eudoxus, who often made him- 
self acceptable to the principal men about court 
by the intelligence which he received from Leon- 5 
tine. When they were both turned of forty (an 
age in which, according to Mr. Cowley, there is no 
dallying with life) they determined, pursuant to 
the resolution they had taken in the beginning 
of their lives, to retire and pass the remainder 10 
of their days in the country. In order to this, 
they both of them married much about the same 
time. Leontine, with his own and his wife's for- 
tune, bought a farm of three hundred a year, 
which lay within the neighborhood of his friend 15 
Eudoxus, who had purchased an estate of as 
many thousands. They were both of them 
fathers about the same time, Eudoxus having a 
son born to him, and Leontine a daughter ; but, 
to the unspeakable grief of the latter, his young 20 
wife (in whom all his happiness was wrapped up) 
died in a few days after the birth of her daugh- 
ter. His affliction would have been insupport- 
able, had not he been comforted by the daily visits 



158 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

and conversations of his friend. As they were 
one day talking together witli their usual inti- 
macy, Leontine, considering how incapable he was 
of giving his daughter a proper education in his 

5 own house, and Eudoxus reflecting on the ordi- 
nary behavior of a son who knows himself to be 
the heir of a great estate, they both agreed upon 
an exchange of children, namely, that the boy 
should be bred up with Leontine as his son, and 

10 that the girl should live with Eudoxus as his 
daughter, till they were each of them arrived at 
years of discretion. The wife of Eudoxus, know- 
ing that her son could not be so advantageously 
brought up as under the care of Leontine, and 

15 considering at the same time that he would be 
perpetually under her own eye, was by degrees 
prevailed upon to fall in with the project. She 
therefore took Leonilla, for that was the name of 
the girl, and educated her as her own daughter. 

20 The two friends on each side had wrought them- 
selves to such an habitual tenderness for the chil- 
dren who were under their direction, that each of 
them had the real passion of a fatlier, where the 
title was but imaginary. Florio, the name of the 



THE TRAINING OF AN HEIR. 159 

young heir that lived with Leontine, though he 
had all the duty and affection imaginable for his 
supposed parent, was taught to rejoice at the sight 
of Eudoxus, who visited his friend very fre- 
quently, and was dictated by his natural affection, 5 
as well as by the rules of prudence, to make him- 
self esteemed and beloved by Florio. The boy 
was now old enough to know his supposed father's 
circumstances, and that therefore he was to make 
his way in the world by his own industry. This lO 
consideration grew stronger in him every day, and 
produced so good an effect that he applied him- 
self with more than ordinary attention to the pur- 
suit of everything which Leontine recommended 
to him. His natural abilities, which were very 15 
good, assisted by the directions of so excellent a 
counsellor, enabled him to make a quicker prog- 
ress than ordinary through all the parts of his 
education. Before he was twenty years of age, 
having finished his studies and exercises with 20 
great applause, he was removed from the univer- 
sity to the inns of court, where there are very few 
that make themselves considerable proficients in 
the studies of the place, who know they shall ar- 



160 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

rive at great estates without them. This was not 
Florio's case ; he found that three hundred a year 
was but a poor estate for Leontine and himself to 
live upon, so that he studied without intermission 

5 till he gained a very good insight into the constitu- 
tion and laws of his country. 

I should have told my reader that whilst Florio 
lived at the house of his foster-father, he was 
always an acceptable guest in the family of Eu- 

10 doxus, where he became acquainted with Leonilla 
from her infancy. His acquaintance with her by 
degrees grew into love, which in a mind trained 
up in all the sentiments of honor and virtue be- 
came a very uneasy passion. He despaired of 

15 gaining an heiress of so great a fortune, and 
would rather have died than attempted it by any 
indirect methods. Leonilla, who was a woman of 
the greatest beauty, joined with the greatest mod- 
esty, entertained at the same time a secret passion 

20 for Florio, but conducted herself with so much 
prudence that she never gave him the least inti- 
mation of it. Florio was now engaged in all 
those arts and improvements that are proper to 
raise a man's private fortune, and give him a fig- 



TEE TRAINING OF AN HEIR. 161 

ure in his country, but secretly tormented with 
that passion which burns with the greatest fury 
in a virtuous and noble heart, when he received a 
sudden summons from Leontine to repair to him 
into the country the next day. For it seems Eu- 5 
doxus was so filled with the report of his son's 
reputation that he could no longer withhold mak- 
ing himself known to him. The morning after 
his arrival at the house of his supposed father, 
Leontine told him that Eudoxus had something of 10 
great importance to communicate to him : upon 
which the good man embraced him and wept. 
Florio was no sooner arrived at the great house 
that stood in his neighborhood, but Eudoxus took 
him by the hand, after the first salutes were over, 15 
and conducted him into his closet. He there 
opened to him the whole secret of his parentage 
and education, concluding after this manner, " I 
have no other way left of acknowledging my grati- 
tude to Leontine, than by marrying you to his 20 
daughter. He shall not lose the pleasure of being 
your father by the discovery I have made to you. 
Leonilla too shall be still my daughter ; her filial 
piety, though misplaced, has been so exemplary 



162 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

that it deserves the greatest reward I can confer 
upon it. You shall have the pleasure of seeing 
a great estate fall to you, which you would have 
lost the relish of, had you known yourself born to 

5 it. Continue only to deserve it in the same man- 
ner you did before you were possessed of it. I 
have left your mother in the next room. Her 
heart yearns towards you. She is making the 
same discoveries to Leonilla which I have made to 

10 yourself." Florio was so overwhelmed with this 
profusion of happiness that he was not able to 
make a reply, but threw himself down at his 
father's feet, and amidst a flood of tears, kissed 
and embraced his knees, asking his blessing, and 

15 expressing in dumb show those sentiments of love, 
duty, and gratitude, that were too big for utter- 
ance. To conclude, the happy pair were married 
and half Eudoxus's estate settled upon them. 
Leon tine and Eudoxus passed the remainder of 

20 their lives together; and received in the dutiful 
and affectionate behavior of Florio and Leonilla 
the just recompense, as well as the natural effects 
of that care wliich they had bestowed upon them 
in their education. L. 



PARTISAN PREJUDICE. 163 



PARTISAN PREJUDICE. 
No. 125. 

Tuesday, July 24, 1711. 

Ne pueri, ne tanta animis adsuescite bella 
Neu patriae validas in viscera vertite vires. 

ViRG. JEn. vi. 832. 

My worthy friend Sir Roger, when we are 
talking of the malice of parties, very frequently 
tells us an accident that happened to him when 
he was a school-boy, which was at a time when 
the feuds ran high between the Roundheads and 5 
Cavaliers. This worthy knight, being then but a 
stripling, had occasion to inquire which was the 
way to St. Anne's Lane, upon whicli the person 
whom he spoke to, instead of answering his ques- 
tion, called him a young popish cur, and asked lo 
him who had made Anne a saint ! The boy, being 
in some confusion, inquired of the next he met, 
which was the way to Anne's Lane ; but was 



164 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

called a prick-eared cur for his pains, and instead 
of being shown the way, was told that she had 
been a saint before he was born, and would be one 
after he was hanged. " Upon this," says Sir Roger, 

5 "I did not think fit. to repeat the former question, 
but going into every lane of the neighborhood, 
asked what they called the name of that lane." 
By which ingenious artifice he found out the place 
he inquired after, without giving offence to any 

10 party. Sir Roger generally closes this narrative 
Avith reflections on the mischief that parties do in 
the country ; how they spoil good neighborhood 
and make honest gentlemen hate one another ; be- 
sides that they manifestly tend to the prejudice of 

15 the land-tax and the destruction of the game. 

There cannot a greater judgment befall a coun- 
try than such a dreadful spirit of division as 
rends a government into two distinct people, and 
makes them greater strangers and more averse to 

20 one another than if they were actually two differ- 
ent nations. The effects of such a division are 
pernicious to the last degree, not only with regard 
to those advantages which they give the common 
enemy, but to those private evils which they pro- 



PARTISAN PREJUDICE. 165 

duce in the heart of ahiiost every particular per- 
son. This influence is very fatal both to men's 
morals and their understandings ; it sinks the 
virtue of a nation, and not only so, but destroys 
even common sense. 5 

A furious party-spirit, when it rages in its full 
violence, exerts itself in civil war and bloodshed ; 
and when it is under its greatest restraints, nat- 
urally breaks out in falsehood, detraction, calumny, 
and a partial administration of justice. In a word, 10 
it fills a nation with spleen and rancor, and ex- 
tinguishes all the seeds of good-nature, compassion, 
and humanity. 

Plutarch says very finely that a man should 
not allow himself to hate even his enemies, be- 15 
cause, says he, if you indulge this passion in some 
occasions, it will rise of itself in others; if you 
hate your enemies, you will contract such a vicious 
habit of mind as by degrees will break out upon 
those who are your friends or those who are in- 20 
different to you. I might here observe how ad- 
mirably this precept of morality (which derives 
the malignity of hatred from the passion itself, 
and not from its object) answers to that great 



166 SIR ROGER I)E COVERLET PAPERS. 

rule which Avas dictated to the world about an 
hundred years before this philosopher wrote ; but 
instead of that, I shall only take notice, with a 
real grief of heart, that the minds of many good 

5 men among us appear soured with party prin- 
ciples, and alienated from one another in such a 
manner as seems to me altogether inconsistent 
with the dictates either of reason or religion. 
Zeal for a public cause is apt to breed passions in 

10 the hearts of virtuous persons, to which the re- 
gard of their own private interest would never 
have betrayed them. 

If this party spirit has so ill an effect on our 
morals, it has likewise a very great one upon 

15 our judgments. We often hear a poor insipid 
paper or pamphlet cried up, and sometimes a 
noble piece depreciated by those who are of a 
different principle from the author. One who is 
actuated by this spirit is almost under an inca- 

20 pacity of discerning either real blemishes or beau- 
ties. A man of merit in a different principle is 
like an object seen in two different mediums, that 
appears crooked or broken, however straight and 
entire it may be iu itself. For this reason there 



PARTISAN PREJUDICE. 167 

is scarce a person of any figure in England, who 
does not go by two contrary characters, as opposite 
to one another as light and darkness. Knowledge 
and learning suffer in a particular manner from 
this strange prejudice, which at present prevails 5 
amongst all ranks and degrees in the British na- 
tion. As men formerly became eminent in learned 
societies by their parts and acquisitions, they now 
distinguish themselves by the warmth and violence 
with which they espouse their respective parties. 10 
Books are valued upon the like considerations : an 
abusive, scurrilous style passes for satire, and a 
dull scheme of party notions is called fine writing. 
There is one piece of sophistry practised by both 
sides, and that is the taking any scandalous story 15 
that has been ever whispered or invented of a 
private man, for a known undoubted truth, and 
raising suitable speculations upon it. Calumnies 
that have been never proved, or have been often 
refuted, are the ordinary postulatums of these in- 20 
famous scribblers, upon which they proceed as 
upon first principles granted by all men, though 
in their hearts they know they are false, or at 
best very doubtful. When they have laid these 



168 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

foundations of scurrility, it is no wonder that their 
superstructure is every way answerable to them. 
If this shameless practice of the present age en- 
dures much longer, praise and reproach will cease 

6 to be motives of action in good men. 

There are certain periods of time in all govern- 
ments when this inhuman spirit prevails. Italy 
was long torn in pieces by the Guelfs and Ghibe- 
lines, and France by those who were for and 

10 against the League ; but it is very unhappy for 
a man to be born in such a stormy and tempestu- 
ous season. It is the restless ambition of artful 
men that thus breaks a people into factions, and 
draws several well-meaning persons to their inter- 

15 est by a specious concern for their country. How 
many honest minds are filled with uncharitable 
and barbarous notions, out of their zeal for the 
public good? What cruelties and outrages would 
they not commit against men of an adverse party, 

20 whom they would honor and esteem, if instead of 
considering them as they are represented, they 
knew them as they are? Thus are persons of 
the greatest probity seduced into shameful errors 
and prejudices, and made bad men even by that 



PARTISAN PREJUDICE. 169 

noblest of principles, the love of their country. I 
cannot here forbear mentioning the famous Spanish 
proverb, " If there were neither fools nor knaves 
in the world, all people would be of one mind." 

For my own part, I could heartily wish that all 5 
honest men would enter into an association for 
the support of one another against the endeavors 
of those whom they ought to look upon as their 
common enemies, whatsoever side they may belong 
to. Were there such an honest body of neutral 10 
forces, we should never see the worst of men in 
great figures of life, because they are useful to a 
party ; nor the best unregarded, because they are 
above practising those methods which would be 
grateful to their faction. We should then single 15 
every criminal out of the herd, and hunt him 
down, however formidable and overgrown he 
might appear : on the contrary, we should shelter 
distressed innocence, and defend virtue, however 
beset with contempt or ridicule, envy or defama- 20 
tion. In short, we should not any longer regard 
our fellow-subjects as Whigs and Tories, but should 
make the man of merit our friend, and the villain 
our enemy. q 



170 ^IJti tiOQEU BE COVERLET FAFEJtiS. 



SIR ROGER'S PARTY SPIRIT. 

No. 126. 

Wednesday, July 25, 1711. 

Tros Rutulusve fiiat, uullo discrimine habebo. 

ViRG. ^n. X. 108. 

In niy yesterday's paper I proposed that the 
honest men of all parties should enter into a kind 
of association for the defence of one another, and 
the confusion of their common enemies. As it is 

5 designed this neutral body should act with a re- 
gard to nothing but truth and equity, and divest 
themselves of the little heats and prepossessions 
that cleave to parties of all kinds, I have prepared 
for them the following form of an association, 

10 which may express their intentions in the most 
plain and simple manner. 

"We whose names are hereunto subscribed, do solemnly 
declare that we do in our consciences believe two and two 
make four; and that we shall adjudge any man whatso- 



SIR nOGEWS PARTY SPIRIT. 171 

ever to be our enemy, wlio endeavors to jjersuade lis to the 
contrary. We are likewise ready to maintain, with the 
hazard of all that is near and dear to us, that six is less 
than seven in all times and all places ; and that ten will 
not be more three years hence than it is at present. We 5 
do also firmly declare that it is our resolution as long as 
we live to call black black, and white wdiite. And we 
shall upon all occasions oppose such persons that upon 
any day of the year shall call black white, or white black, 
with the utmost peril of our lives and fortunes.'"' 10 

Were there such a combination of honest men, 
who, without any regard to places, would endeavor 
to extirpate all such furious zealots as would sac- 
rifice one half of their country to the passion and 
interest of the other; as also such infamous hypo- 15 
crites that are for promoting their own advantage 
under color of the public good ; with all the prof- 
ligate immoral retainers to each side, that have 
nothing to recommend them but an implicit sub- 
mission to their leaders ; we should soon see that 20 
furious party spirit extinguished which may in 
time expose us to the derision and contempt of all 
the nations about us. 

A member of this society that would thus care- 
fully employ himself in making room for merit, 25 



172 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

by throwing down the worthless and depraved 
part of mankind from those conspicuous stations 
of Ufe to which they have been sometimes ad- 
vanced, and all this without any regard to his 

5 private interest, would be no small benefactor to 
his country. 

T remember to have read in Diodorus Siculus 
an account of a very active little animal, which I 
think he calls the ichneumon, that makes it the 

10 whole business of his life to break the eggs of the 
crocodile, which he is always in search after. This 
instinct is the more remarkable, because the ich- 
neumon never feeds upon the eggs he has broken, 
nor in any other way finds his account in them. 

15 Were it not for the incessant labors of this indus- 
trious animal, Egypt (says the historian) would 
be overrun with crocodiles ; for the Egyptians are 
so far from destroying those pernicious creatures, 
that they worship them as gods. 

20 If we look into the behavior of ordinary parti- 
sans, we shall find them far from resembling this 
disinterested animal ; and rather acting after the 
example of the wild Tartars, who are ambitious of 
destroying a man of the most extraordinary parts 



^7A' ROGER'S PARTY SPIRIT. 173 

and accomplishments, as thinking that, upon his 
decease, the same talents, whatever post they quali- 
fied him for, enter of course into his destroyer. 

As in the whole train of my speculations, I 
have endeavored, as much as I am able, to extin- 5 
guish that pernicious spirit of passion and preju- 
dice which rages with the same violence in all 
parties, I am still the more desirous of doing some 
good in this particular, because I observe that the 
spirit of party reigns more in the country than in 10 
the town. It here contracts a kind of brutality 
and rustic fierceness, to which men of a politer 
conversation are wholly strangers. It extends 
itself even to the return of the bow and the hat ; 
and at the same time that the heads of parties 15 
preserve towards one another an outward show of 
good breeding, and keep up a perpetual inter- 
course of civilities, their tools that are dispersed 
in these outlying parts will not so much as mingle 
together at a cock-match. This humor fills the 20 
country with several periodical meetings of Whig 
jockeys and Tory fox-hunters ; not to mention the 
innumerable curses, frowns, and whispers it pro- 
duces at a quarter-session. 



174 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

I do not know whether I have observed in any 
of my former papers that my friends, Sir Roger 
de Coverley and Sir Andrew Freeport, are of 
different principles ; the first of them inclined to 

5 the landed, and the other to the moneyed interest. 
This humor is so moderate in each of them that 
it proceeds no farther than to an agreeable rail- 
lery, which very often diverts the rest of the club. 
I find, however, that the knight is a much stronger 

10 Tory in the country than in town, which, as he 
has told me in my ear, is absolutely necessary for 
the keeping up his interest. In all our journey 
from London to his house, we did not so much as 
bait at a Whig inn ; or if by chance the coachman 

15 stopped at a wrong place, one of Sir Roger's ser- 
vants would ride up to his master full speed, and 
whisper to him that the master of the house was 
against such an one in the last election. This 
often betrayed us into hard beds and bad cheer ; 

20 for we were not so inquisitive about the inn as the 
inn-keeper ; and provided our landlord's principles 
were sound, did not take any notice of the stale- 
ness of his provisions. This I found still the more 
inconvenient, because the better the host was, the 



SIB ROGER'S PARTY SPIRIT. 175 

worse generally were his accommodations ; the 
fellow knowing very well that those who were his 
friends would take up with coarse diet and an hard 
lodging. For these reasons, all the while I was 
upon the road, I dreaded entering into an house 5 
of any one that Sir Roger had applauded for an 
honest man. 

Since my stay at Sir Roger's in the country, I 
daily find more instances of this narrow party 
humor. Being upon the bowling-green at a neigh- 10 
boring market-town the other day, (for that is the 
place where the gentlemen of one side meet once 
a week) I observed a stranger among them of a 
better presence and genteeler behavior than ordi- 
nary ; but was much surprised, that notwithstand- 15 
ing he was a very fair bettor, nobody would take 
him up. But upon inquiry I found that he was 
one who had given a disagreeable vote in a former 
Parliament, for which reason there was not a man 
upon that bowling-green who would have so much 20 
correspondence with him as to win his money of 
him. 

Among other instances of this nature, I must 
not omit one which concerns myself. Will Wim- 



176 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

ble was the other day relating several strange 
stories that he had picked up, nobody knows 
where, of a certain great man ; and upon my star- 
ing at him, as one that was surprised to hear such 

5 things in the country, which had never been so 
much as whispered in the town. Will stopped 
short in the thread of his discourse, and after 
dinner asked my friend Sir Roger in liis ear, if he 
was sure that I was not a fiuiatic. 

10 ^It gives me a serious concern to see such a 
spirit of dissension in the country ; not only as it 
destroys virtue and common sense, and renders us 
in a manner barbarians towards one another, but 
as it perpetuates our animosities, widens our 

15 breaches, and transmits our present passions and 
prejudices to our posterity. For my own part, I 
am sometimes afraid that I discover the seeds of 
a civil war in these our divisions : and therefore 
cannot but bewail, as in their first principles, the 

20 miseries and calamities of our children. C. 



SIR ROGER AND THE GIPSIES. 177 



SIR ROGER AND THE GYPSIES. 

No. 130. 

Monday, July 30, 1711, 
■Semperque recentes 



, Coiivectare juvat prjcdas, et vivere rapto. 

ViRcj. .En. vii. 748. 

As I was yesterday riding out in the fields with 
my friend Sir Roger, we saw at a little distance 
from us a troop of gypsies. Upon tlie first dis- 
covery of them, my friend was in some doubt 
whether he should not exert the Justice of the 5 
Peace upon such a band of lawless vagrants : but 
not having his clerk with him, who is a necessary 
counsellor on these occasions, and fearing that his 
poultry might fare the worse for it, he let the 
thought drop. But at the same time gave me a 10 
particular account of the mischiefs they do in the 
country, in stealing peoples' goods, and spoiling 
their servants. " If a stray piece of linen hangs 
upon an hedge,*' says Sir Roger, " they are sure to 



178 ISIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

have it; if the hog loses his way in the fields, it 
is ten to one but he becomes their prey: our 
geese cannot live in peace for them. If a man 
prosecutes them with severity, his hen-roost is 

5 sure to pay for it. They generally straggle into 
these parts about this time of the year; and set 
the heads of our servant-maids so agog for hus- 
bands, that we do not expect to have any business 
done, as it should be, whilst they are in the 

10 country. I have an honest dairy-maid who crosses 
their hands with a piece of silver every summer ; 
and never fails being promised the handsomest 
young fellow in the parish for her pains. Your 
friend the butler has been fool enough to be 

15 seduced by them ; and though he is sure to lose 
a knife, a fork, or a spoon, every time his fortune 
is told him, generally shuts himself up in the 
pantry with an old gypsy for above half an hour 
once in a twelvemonth. Sweethearts are the 

20 things they live upon, which they bestow very 
plentifully upon all those that apply themselves 
to them." 

Sir Roger, observing that I listened with great 
attention to his account of a people who were so 



SIR ROGER AND THE GYPSIES. 179 

entirely new to me, told me that if I would, they 
should tell us our fortunes. As I was very well 
pleased with the knight's proposal, we rid up and 
communicated our hands to them. A Cassandra 
of the crew, after having examined my hues very 5 
diligently, told me that 1 loved a pretty maid in 
a corner, that I was a good woman's man. My 
friend Sir Roger alighted from his horse, and ex- 
posing his palm to two or three that stood by him, 
they crumpled it into all shapes, and diligently 10 
scanned every wrinkle that could be made in it ; 
when one of them, who was older, and more sun- 
burnt, than the rest, told him that he had a widow 
in his line of life : upon which the knight cried, 
" Go, go, you are an idle baggage ; " and at the 15 
same time smiled upon me. The gypsy, finding 
he was not displeased in his heart, told him, after 
a further inquiry into his hand, that his true-love 
was constant, and that she should dream of him 
to-night. My old friend cried pish, and bid her 20 
go on. The gypsy told him that he was a bach- 
elor, but would not be so long ; and that he was 
dearer to somebody than he thought. The knight 
still repeated, she was an idle baggage, and bid 



180 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

her go on. " Ah, master," says the gypsy, " that 
roguish leer of yours makes a pretty woman's 
heart ache ; you ha'n't that simper about the 
mouth for nothing." The uncouth gibberish with 

5 which all this was uttered, like the darkness of an 
oracle, made us the more attentive to it. To be 
short, the knight left the money with her that he 
had crossed her hand with, and got up again on 
his horse. 

10 As we were riding away. Sir Roger told me 
that he knew several sensible people who believed 
these gypsies now and then foretold very strange 
things ; and for half an hour together appeared 
more jocund than ordinary. In the height of this 

15 good humor, meeting a common beggar upon the 
road who was no conjurer, as he went to relieve 
him, he found his pocket was picked ; that being 
a kind of palmistry at which this race of vermin 
are very dexterous. 

20 I might here entertain my reader with historical 
remarks on this idle, profligate people, who infest 
all the countries of Europe, and live in the midst 
of governments in a kind of commonwealth by 
themselves. But, instead of entering into observa- 



SIR UOJELl AND THE GYPSIES. 181 

tions of this nature, I shall fill the remaining part 
of my paper with a story which is still fresh in 
Holland, and was printed in one of our monthly 
accounts about twenty years ago. " As the 
Trekschuyt, or Hackney-boat, which carries pas- 5 
sengers from Leyden to Amsterdam, was putting 
off, a boy running along the side of the canal, 
desired to be taken in ; which the master of the 
boat refused, because the lad had not quite money 
enough to pay the usual fare. An eminent mer- lo 
chant, being pleased with the looks of the boy, 
and secretly touched with compassion towards 
him, paid the money for him, and ordered him to 
be taken on board. Upon talking with him after- 
wards, he found that he could speak readily in 15 
three or four languages, and learned upon further 
examination that he had been stolen away when 
he was a child by a gypsy, and had rambled ever 
since with a gang of those strollers up and down 
several parts of Europe. It happened that the 20 
merchant, whose heart seems to have inclined 
towards the boy by a secret kind of instinct, had 
himself lost a child some years before. The 
parents, after a long search for him, gave him for. 



182 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

drowned in one of the canals with which that 
country abounds ; and the mother was so afflicted 
at the loss of a fine boy, who was her only son, 
that she died for grief of it. Upon laying together 

5 all particulars, and examining the several moles 
and marks by which the mother used to describe 
the child when he was first missing, the boy 
proved to be the son of the merchant, whose heart 
had so unaccountably melted at the sight of him. 

10 The lad was very well pleased to find a father 
who was so rich, and likely to leave him a good 
estate : the father, on the other hand, was not a 
little delighted to see a son return to him, whom 
he had given for lost, with such a strength of con- 

15 stitution, sharpness of understanding, and skill in 
languages." Here the printed story leaves off; 
but if I may give credit to reports, our linguist, 
having received such extraoidinary rudiments 
towards a good education, was afterwards trained 

20 up in every thing that becomes a gentleman ; 
wearing off, by little and little, all the vicious 
habits and practices that he had been used to in 
the course of his peregrinations : nay, it is said, 
that he has since been employed in foreign courts 



SIR ROGER AND THE GYPSIES. 183 

upon national business, with great reputation to 
himself, and honor to those who sent him, and 
that he has visited several countries as a public 
minister, in which he formerly wandered as a 

gypsy- CJ. 



18 J: SIM ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



THE END OF THE SPECTATOR'S 
VISIT. 

No. 131. 

Tuesday, July 31, 1711. 
Ipsae rursus concedite sylvae. 

ViRG. Eel. X. 63. 

It is usual for a man who loves country sports 
to preserve the game in his own grounds, and 
divert himself upon those that belong to his 
neighbor. My friend Sir Roger generally goes 

5 two or three miles from his house, and gets into 
the frontiers of his estate, before he beats about 
in search of a hare or partridge, on purpose to 
spare his own fields, where he is always sure of 
finding diversion when the worst comes to the 

10 worst. By this means the breed about his house 
has time to increase and multiply, besides that the 
sport is more agreeable where the game is harder 
to come at, and where it does not lie so thick as 



THE END OF THE SPECTATOR'S VISIT 185 

to produce any perplexity or confusion in the 
pursuit. For these reasons the country gentle- 
man, like the fox, seldom preys near his own 
home. 

In the same manner I have made a month's 5 
excursion out of the town, which is the great 
field of game for sportsmen of my species, to try 
my fortune in the country, where I have started 
several subjects, and hunted them down, with 
some pleasure to myself, and I hope to others. I 10 
am here forced to use a great deal of diligence 
before I can spring any thing to my mind, whereas 
in town, whilst I am following one character, it is 
ten to one but I am crossed in my way by another, 
and put up such a variety of odd creatures in 15 
both sexes, that they foil the scent of one another, 
and puzzle the chase. My greatest difficulty in 
the country is to find sport, and in town to choose 
it. In the meantime, as I have given a whole 
month's rest to the cities of London and West- 20 
minster, I promise myself abundance of new game 
upon my return thither. 

It is indeed high time for me to leave the 
country, since I find the whole neighborhood begin 



18G SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

to grow very inquisitive after my name and 
character: my love of solitude, taciturnity, and 
particular way of life having raised a great curi- 
osity in all these parts. 

5 The notions which have been framed of me are 
various ; some look upon me as very proud, some 
as very modest, and some as very melancholy. 
Will Wimble, as my friend the butler tells me, 
observing me very much alone, and extremely 

10 silent when I am in company, is afraid I have 
killed a man. The country people seem to sus- 
pect me for a conjurer ; and some of them, hear- 
ing of the visit which I made to Moll White, will 
needs have it that Sir Roger has brought down a 

15 cunning man with him, to cure the old woman 

and free the country from her charms. So that 

the character which I go under in part of the 

neighborhood is what they here call a ivhite witch. 

A justice of peace, who lives about five miles off, 

20 and is not of Sir Roger's party, has, it seems, said 
twice or thrice at his table, that he wishes Sir Roger 
does not harbor a Jesuit in his house, and that 
he thinks the gentlemen of the country would do 
very well to make me give some account of myself. 



THE END OF THE SPECTATOR'S VISIT. 18T 

On the other side, some of Sir Roger's friends 
are afraid the old knight is imposed upon by a 
designing feUow, and as they have heard he con- 
verses very promiscuously when he is in toAvn, do 
not know but he has brought down with him 5 
some discarded Whig, that is sullen and says 
nothing, because he is out of place. 

Such is the variety of opinions which are here 
entertained of me, so that I pass among some for 
a disaffected person, and among others for a 10 
Popish priest ; among some for a wizard, and 
among others for a murderer ; and all this for no 
other reason that I can imagine, but because I do 
not hoot and halloo and make a noise. It is true, 
my friend Sir Roger tells them that it is my way, 15 
and that I am only a philosopher ; but this will 
not satisfy them. They think there is more in 
me than he discovers, and that I do not hold my 
tongue for nothing. 

For these and other reasons I shall set out for 20 
London to-morrow, having found by experience 
that the country is not a place for a person of my 
temper, who does not love jollity, and what they 
call good-neighborhood. A man that is out of 



188 SIR ROGER I)E COVERLEY PAPERS. 

humor when an unexpected guest breaks in upon 
him, and does not care for sacrificing an afternoon 
to every chance comer ; that will be the master of 
his OAvn time, and the pursuer of his own inclina- 

5 tions, makes but a very unsociable figure in this 
kind of life. I shall therefore retire into the 
town, if I may make use of that phrase, and get 
into the crowd again as fast as I can, in order to 
be alone. I can there raise what speculations I 

10 please upon others, without being observed my- 
self, and at tlie same time enjoy all the advan- 
tages of company with all the privileges of soli- 
tude. In the meanwhile, to finish the month, and 
conclude these my rural speculations, I shall here 

15 insert a letter from my friend Will Honeycomb, 
who has not lived a month for these forty years 
out of the smoke of liondon, and rallies me after 
his way upon my country life. 

" Dear Spec. 
20 "I SUPPOSE this letter will find thee picking of daisies, 
or smelling to a lock of hay, or passing away thy time in 
some innocent country diversion of the like nature. I 
have, however, orders from the club to summon thee up to 
town, being all of us cursedly afraid thou wilt not be able 



THE END OF THE SPECTATOR'S VISIT. 189 

to relish our company after thy conversations with Moll 
White and Will Wimble. Prythee don't send us up any 
more stories of a cock and bull, nor frighten the town with . 
spirits and witches. Thy speculations begin to smell con- 
foundedly of w^oods and meadows. If thou dost not come 5 
up quickly we shall conclude thou art in love with one of 
Sir Roger's dairy maids. Service to the Knight. Sir An- 
drew is grown the cock of the club since he left us, and 
if he does not return quickly, will make every mother's 
son of us commonwealth's men. 10 

" Dear Spec, thine eternally, 

'* Will Honeycomb." 
C. 



190 SIR ROGELl 1)E COVEtiLEY PAPERS. 



THE SPECTATOR'S JOURNEY TO 
LONDON. 

No. 132. 

Wednesday, Aiig 1. 1711 

Qui aiit tempus quid postulet nou videt, aut plura loquitur, 
aut se ostentat, aut eoruni quibuscum est rationem non habet, 
is ineptus esse dicitur. — Cicero, De Oratore, ii. 4, 17. 

Having notified to my good friend Sir Roger 
that I should set out for London the next day, his 
horses were ready at the appointed hour in the 
evening ; and attended by one of his grooms, I 

5 arrived at the county town at twiHght, in order to 
be ready for the stage-coach the da}^ following. 
As soon as we arrived at the inn, the servant who 
waited upon me inquired of the chamberlain in 
my hearing what company he had for the coach. 

10 The fellow answered, " Mrs. I>etty Arable, the 
great fortune, and the widow, her mother ; a re- 
cruiting officer (who took a place because tliey 



THE SFECTATOWS JOURNEY TO LONDON. 191 

were to go) ; young Squire Quickset, her cousin 
(that lier mother wished her to be married to ) ; 
Ephraim, the Quaker, her guardian ; and a gentle- 
man that had studied himself dumb from Sir 
Roger de Coverley's." I observed by what he 5 
said of myself that according to his office he dealt 
much in intelligence ; and doubted not but there 
was some foundation for his reports of the rest of 
the company, as well as for the whimsical account 
he gave of me. 10 

The next morning at daybreak we were all 
called ; and I, who know my own natural shy- 
ness, and endeavor to be as little liable to be 
disputed with as possible, dressed immediately, 
that I might make no one wait. The first prepa- 15 
ration for our setting out was, that the captain's 
halfpike was placed near the coachman, and a 
drum behind the coach. In the meantime the 
drummer, the captain's equipage, was very loud 
that none of the captain's things should be placed 20 
so as to be spoiled ; upon which his cloak-bag was 
fixed in the seat of the coach ; and the captain 
himself, according to a frequent, though invidi- 
ous behavior of military men, ordered his man to 



192 SIR ROGER BE COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

look sharp that none but one of the ladies should 
have the place he had taken fronting to the 
coach-box. 

We were in some little time fixed in our seats, 

5 and sat with that dislike which people not too 
good natured usually conceive of each other at 
first sight. The coach jumbled us insensibly into 
some sort of familiarity, and we had not moved 
above two miles when the widow asked the cap- 

10 tain what success he had in his recruiting. The 
officer, with a frankness he believed very graceful, 
told her that indeed he had but very little luck, 
and had suffered much by desertion, therefore 
should be glad to end his warfare in the service 

15 of her or lier fair daughter. " In a word," con- 
tinued he, " I am a soldier, and to be plain is my 
character ; you see me, madam, young, sound, and 
impudent ; take me yourself, widow, or give me 
to her ; I will be wholly at your disposal. I am a 

20 soldier of fortune, ha I " This was followed by 
a vain laugh of his own, and a deep silence of all 
the rest of the company. I had nothing left for 
it but to fall fast asleep, which I did with all 
speed. " Come," said he, " resolve upon it, we 



THE SPECTATOR'S JOURNEY TO LONDON. 193 

will make a wedding at the next town : we will 
wake this pleasant companion who has fallen 
asleep, to be the brideman, and," giving the Quaker 
a clap on the knee, he concluded, " this sly saint, 
who, I'll warrant, understands what's what as 5 
well as you or I, widow, shall give the bride as 
father." 

The Quaker, who happened to be a man of 
smartness, answered, " Friend, I take it in good 
part that thou hast given me the authority of a 10 
father over this comely and virtuous child ; and I 
must assure thee that, if I have the giving her, 
I shall not bestow her on thee. Thy mirth, friend, 
savoreth of folly ; thou art a person of a light 
mind ; thy drum is a type of thee — it soundeth 15 
because it is empty. Verily, it is not from thy 
fulness but from thy emptiness that thou hast 
spoken this day. Friend, friend, we have hired 
this coach in partnership with thee, to carry us 
to the great city ; we cannot go any other way. 20 
This worthy mother must hear thee if thou wilt 
needs utter thy follies : we cannot help it, friend, 
I say — if thou wilt, we must hear thee ; but, if 
thou wert a man of understanding, thou wouldst 



194 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

not take advantage of thy courageous countenance 
to abash us children of peace. Thou art, thou 
sayest, a soldier ; give quarter to us who cannot 
resist thee. Why didst thou fleer at our friend, 

5 who feigned himself asleep? He said nothing, 
but how dost thou know what he containeth? If 
thou speakest improper things in the hearing of 
this virtuous young virgin, consider it as an out- 
rage against a distressed person that cannot get 

10 from thee : to speak indiscreetly what we are 
obliged to hear, by being hasped up with thee in 
this public vehicle, is in some degree assaulting 
on the high road." 

Here Ephraim paused, and the captain with an 

15 happy and uncommon impudence, which can be 
convicted and support itself at the same time, 
cries, " Faith, friend, I thank thee ; I should have 
been a little impertinent if thou hadst not repri- 
manded me. Come, thou art, I see, a smoky old 

20 fellow, and 111 be very orderly the ensuing part of 
the journey. I was going to give myself airs, but, 
ladies, I beg pardon." 

The captain was so little out of humor, and our 
company was so far from being soured by this 



THE ISFECTArOR'S JOURNEY TO LONDON. 195 

little ruffle, that Ephraim and he took a particular 
delight in being agreeable to each other for the 
future ; and assumed their different provinces in 
the conduct of the company. Our reckonings, 
apartments, and accommodation fell under Eph- 5 
raim ; and the captain looked to all disputes on 
the road, as the good behavior of our coachman, 
and the right he had of taking place as going to 
London of all vehicles coming from thence. 

The occurrences we met with were ordinary, 10 
and very little happened which could entertain by 
the relation of them ; but when I considered the 
company we were in, I took it for no small good 
fortune that the whole journey was not spent in 
impertinences, which to one part of us might be 15 
an entertainment, to the other a suffering. 

What, therefore, Ephraim said when we were 
almost arrived at London had to me an air not 
only of good understanding but good breeding. 
Upon the young lady's expressing her satisfaction 20 
in the journey, and declaring how delightful it 
had been to her, Ephraim delivered himself as 
follows : " There is no ordinary part of human 
life which expresseth so much a good mind and a 



196 iSIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

right inward man as his behavior upon meeting 
with strangers, especially such as may seem the 
most unsuitable companions to him ; such a man, 
when he falleth in the way with persons of sim- 

5 plicity and innocence, however knowing he may 
be in the ways of men, will not vaunt himself 
thereof : but will the- rather liide his superiority to 
them, that he may not be painful unto them. My 
good friend," continued he, turning to the officer, 

10 " thee and I are to part by and by, and perad ven- 
ture we may never meet again ; but be advised by 
a plain man ; modes and apparel are but trifles to 
the real man, therefore do not think such a man 
as thyself terrible for thy garb, nor such a one as 

15 me contemptible for mine. When two such as 
thee and I meet, with affections as we ought to 
have towards each other, thou shouldst rejoice 
to see my peaceable demeanor, and I should be 
glad to see thy strength and ability to protect 

20 me in it." T. 



SIR ROGER'S ARRIVAL IN TOWN, 197 



SIR ROGER'S ARRIVAL IN TOWN. 

No. 269. 

Tuesday, January 8, 1711-12. 

^vo rarissima nostro 

Simplicitas 

Ovid, Ars Am. i. 241. 

I WAS this morning surprised with a great 
knocking at the door, when my landlady's daugh- 
ter came up to me and told me that there was a 
man below desired to speak with me. Upon my 
asking her who it was, she told me it was a very 5 
grave elderly person, but that she did not know 
his name. I immediately went down to him, and 
found him to be the coachman of my worthy 
friend Sir Roger de Coverley. He told me that 
his master came to town last night, and would be 10 
glad to take a turn with me in Gray's Inn walks. 
As I was wondering to myself what had brought 
Sir Roger to town, not having lately received any 



198 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

letter from liim, he told me that his master was 
come up to get a sight of Prince Eugene, and 
that he desired I would immediately meet him. 
1 was not a little pleased with the curiosit}^ of 

5 the old knight, though I did not much wonder at 
it, having heard him say more than once in pri- 
vate discourse that he looked upon Prince Euge- 
nio (for so the knight always calls him) to be a 
greater man than Scanderbeg. 

10 I was no sooner come to Gray's Inn walks, but 
I heard my friend upon the terrace he77i7ning twice 
or thrice to himself with great vigor, for he loves 
to clear liis pipes in good air (to make use of his 
own phrase) and is not a little pleased with any 

15 one who takes notice of the strength which he 
still exerts in his morning he7ns. 

I was touched with a secret joy at the sight of 
the good old man, who before he saw me was en- 
gaged in conversation with a beggar-man that had 

20 asked an alms of him. I could hear my friend 
chide him for not finding out some work ; but at 
the same time saw him put his hand in his pocket 
and give him sixpence. 

Our salutations were very hearty on both sides. 



SIR ROGER'S ARRIVAL IN TOWN. 199 

consisting of many kind shakes of the hand, and 
several affectionate looks which we cast upon one 
another. After which the knight told me m}^ 
good friend his chaplain was very well, and much 
at my service, and that the Sunday before he had 5 
made a most incomparable sermon out of Doctor 
Barrow. " I have left," says he, " all my affairs 
in his hands, and being willing to lay an obliga- 
tion upon liim, have deposited with him thirty 
marks, to be distributed among his poor parish 10 
ioners." 

He then proceeded to acquaint me with the 
welfare of Will Wimble. Upon which he put his 
hand into his fob, and presented me in his name 
with a tobacco stopper, telling me that Will had 15 
been busy all the beginning of the winter in turn- 
ing great quantities of them ; and that he made a 
present of one to every gentleman of the country 
who has good principles and smokes. He added 
that poor Will was at present under great tribula- 20 
tion, for that Tom Touchy had taken the law of 
him for cutting some hazel sticks out of one of 
his hedges. 

Among other pieces of news which the knight 



200 SIR ROGER BE COVER LEY PAPERS. 

brought from his country seat, he informed me 
that Moll White was dead ; and that about a 
month after her death the wind was so very high, 
that it blew down the end of one of his barns. 

5 " But for my part," says Sir Roger, *' I do not 
think that the old woman had any hand in it." 
He afterwards fell into an account of the diver- 
sions which had passed in his house during the 
holidays, for Sir Roger, after the laudable custom 

10 of his ancestors, always keeps open house at 
Christmas. I learned from him, that he had 
killed eight fat hogs for the season, that he had 
dealt about his chines very liberally amongst his 
neighbors, and that in particular he had sent a 

15 string of hog's puddings with a pack of cards to 
every poor family in the parish. " I have often 
thought," says Sir Roger, " it happens very well 
that Christmas should fall out in the middle of the 
winter. It is the most dead uncomfortable time 

20 of the year, when the poor people would suffer 
very much from their poverty and cold, if they 
had not good cheer, warm fires, and Christmas 
gambols to support them. I love to rejoice their 
poor hearts at this season, and to see the whole 



SIR ROGER'S ARRIVAL IN TOWN. 201 

village merry in my great hall. I allow a double 
quantity of malt to my small beer, and set it a- 
running for twelve days to every one that calls for 
it. I have always a piece of cold beef and a 
mince-pie upon the table, and am wonderfully 5 
pleased to see my tenants pass away a whole even- 
ing in playing their innocent tricks and smutting 
one another. Our friend Will Wimble is as merry 
as any of them, and shows a thousand roguish 
tricks upon these occasions." 10 

1 was very much delighted with the reflection 
of my old friend, which carried so much goodness 
in it. He then launched out into the praise of 
the late act of Parliament for securing the Church 
of England, and told me with great satisfaction 15 
that he believed it already began to take effect: 
for that a rigid dissenter, who chanced to dine at 
his house on Christmas day, had been observed to 
eat very plentifully of his plum-porridge. 

After having dispatched all our country mat- 20 
ters. Sir Roger made several inquiries concerning 
the club, and particularly of his old antagonist. 
Sir Andrew Freeport. He asked me with a kind 
of smile, whether Sir Andrew had not taken the 



202 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

advantage of his absence, to vent among them 
some of his republican doctrines ; but soon after 
gathering up his countenance into a more than 
ordinary seriousness, " Tell me truly," says he, 

5 " don't you think Sir Andrew had a hand in the 

Pope's Procession " but without giving me 

time to answer him, " Well, well," says he, " I 
know you are a wary man and do not care to 
talk of public matters." 

10 The knight then asked me if I had seen Prince 
Eugenio ; and made me promise to get him a 
stand in some convenient place where he might 
have a full sight of that extraordinary man, whose 
presence does so much honor to the British nation. 

15 He dwelt very long on the praises of this great 
general, and I found that since I was with him in 
the country, he had drawn many observations 
together out of his reading in Baker's Chronicle, 
and other authors, who always lie in his hall win- 

20 dow, which very much redound to the honor of 
this prince. 

Having passed away the greatest part of the 
morning in hearing the knight's reflections, which 
w^ere partly private, and partly political, he asked 



me if I would smoke a pipe with him over a dish 
of coffee at Squire's. As I love the old man, 1 
take a delight in complying with every thing that 
is agreeable to him, and accordingly waited on him 
to the coffee-house, where his venerable figure 5 
drew upon us the eyes of the whole room. He 
had no sooner seated himself at the upper end of 
the high table, but he called for a clean pipe, a 
paper of tobacco, a dish of coffee, a wax candle, 
and the Supplement, with such an air of cheerful- 10 
ness and good humor, that all the boys in the 
coffee-room (who seemed to take pleasure in serv- 
ing him) were at once employed on his several 
errands, insomuch that nobody else could come 
at a dish of tea, till the knight had got all his 15 
conveniences about him. L. 



204 ISIB ROGER I)E COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 



SIR ROGER'S VISIT TO WESTMINSTER 
ABBEY. 

No. 329. 

Tuesday, March 18, 1711-12. 

Ire tamen restat Numa quo devenit et Ancus. 

HOR. Ep. i. vi. 27. 

My friend Sir Roger de Coverley told me t'other 
night, that he had been reading my paper upon 
Westminster Abbey, in which, says he, there are 
a great many ingenious fancies. He told me at 

5 the same time that he observed I had promised 
another paper upon the tombs, and that lie should 
be glad to go and see them with me, not having 
visited them since he had read history. I could 
not at first imagine how this came into the knight's 

10 head, till I recollected that he had been very busy 
all last summer upon Baker's Chronicle, which he 
has quoted several times in his dispute Avitli Sir 
Andrew Freeport since his last coming to town. 



BIS VISIT TO WESTMINSTER ABBEY. ^05 

Accordingly I promised to call upon him the next 
morning, tluit we might go together to the Abbey. 

I found the knight under his butler's hands, who 
always shaves him. He was no sooner dressed, 
than he called for a glass of the widow True by 's 5 
water, which he told me he always drank before 
he went abroad. He recommended me to a dram 
of it at the same time, with so much heartiness 
that I could not forbear drinking it. As soon as 
I had got it down, I found it very unpalatable ; 10 
upon which the knight, observing that I had made 
several wry faces, told me that he knew I should 
not like it at first, but that it was the best thing in 
the world against the stone or gravel. 

I could have wished, indeed, that he had ac- 15 
quainted me with the virtues of it sooner ; but it 
was too late to complain, and I knew what he had 
done was out of good-will. Sir Roger told me 
further, that he looked upon it to be very good 
for a man whilst he staid in town, to keep off 20 
infection, and that he got together a quantity of 
it upon the first news of the sickness being at 
Dantzic, w^hen of a sudden, turning short to one 
of his servants, who stood behind him, he bid him 



206 SIR ROGER DE COVER LEY PAPERS 

call a hackney coach, and take care it was an 
elderly man that drove it. 

He then resumed his discourse upon Mrs. True- 
by's water, telling me that the widow Trueby was 

5 one who did more good than all the doctors and 
apothecaries in the county : that she distilled every 
poppy that grew within five miles of lier, that she 
distributed her water gratis among all sorts of 
people ; to which the knight added that she had 

10 a very great jointure, and that the whole country 

would fain have it a match between him and her ; 

" And truly," says Sir Roger, " if I had not been 

engaged, perhaps I could not have done better." 

His discourse was broken off by his man's tell- 

15 ing him he had called a coach. Upon our going 
to it, after having cast his eye upon the wheels, 
he. asked the coachman if his axletree was good ; 
upon the fellow's telling him he would warrant it, 
the knight turned to me, told me he looked like 

20 an honest man, and went in without further 
ceremony. 

We had not gone far, when Sir Roger, popping 
out his head, called the coachman down from his 
box, and upon his presenting himself at the win- 



HIS VISIT TO WESTMIXSTEH ABBEY. 207 

dow, asked liim if he smoked ; as I was consider- 
ing what this would end in, he bid him stop by 
the way at any good tobacconist's, and take in a 
roll of their best Virginia. Nothing material hap- 
pened in the remaining part of our journey, till we 5 
were set down at the west end of the Abbey. 

As we went up the body of the church the knight 
pointed at the trophies upon one of the new 
monuments, and cried out, " A brave man I war- 
rant him ! " Passing afterwards by Sir Cloudsley 10 
Shovel, he flung his hand that way, and cried, " Sir 
Cloudsley Shovel ! a very gallant man ! " As we 
stood before Busby's tomb, the knight uttered 
himself again after the same manner, " Dr. Busby, 
a great man ! he whipped my grandfather ; a ver}^ 15 
great man ! I should have gone to him myself, if 
I had not been a blockhead ; a very great man ! " 

We were immediately conducted into the little 
chapel on the right hand. Sir Roger, planting 
himself at our historian's elbow, was very atten- 20 
tive to every thing he said, particularly to the 
account he gave us of the lord who had cut off 
the King of Morocco's head. Among several other 
figures, he was very well pleased to see the states- 



208 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

man Cecil upon his knees ; and, concluding them 
all to be great men, was conducted to the figure 
which represents that martyr to good housewifery, 
who died by the prick of a needle. Upon our in- 

5 terpreter's telling us that she was a maid of honor 
to Queen Elizabeth, the knight was very inquisi- 
tive into her name and family ; and after having 
regarded her finger for some time, " I wonder," 
said he, " that Sir Richard Baker has said nothing 

10 of her in his Chronicle." 

We were then conveyed to the two coronation- 
chairs, where my old friend, after having heard 
that the stone underneath the most ancient of 
them, which was brought from Scotland, was 

15 called Jacob's Pillow, sat himself down in the 
chair : and looking like the figure of an old Gothic 
king, asked our interpreter what authority they 
had to say that Jacob had ever been in Scotland. 
The fellow, instead of returning him an answer, 

20 told him, that he hoped his honor would pay his 
forfeit. I could observe Sir Roger a little ruffled 
upon being thus trepanned ; but our guide not 
insisting upon his demand, the knight soon recov- 
ered his good humor, and whispered in my ear 



ms VISIT TO WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 209 

that if Will Wimble were with us, and saw those 
two chairs, it would go hard but he would get a 
tobacco-stopper out of one or t other of them. 

Sir Roger, in the next place, laid his hand upon 
Edward the Third's sword, and leaning upon the 5 
pommel of it, gave us the whole history of the 
Black Prince; concluding, that in Sir Richard 
Baker's opinion, Edward the Third was one of the 
greatest princes that ever sat upon the English 
throne. .^ 

We were then shown Edward the Confessor's 
tomb ; upon which Sir Roger acquainted us that 
he was the first who touched for the Evil; and 
afterwards Henry the Fourth's, upon which he 
shook his head, and told us there was fine reading 15 
in the casualties of that reign. 

Our conductor then pointed to that monument 
where there is the figure of one of our English 
kings without an head; and upon giving us to 
know that the head, which was of beaten silver, 20 
had been stolen away several years since : '' Some 
Whig, 111 warrant you," says Sir Roger, "you 
ought to lock up your kings better ; they will carry 
off the body too, if you don't take care." 



210 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

The glorious names of Henry the Fifth and 
Queen Elizabeth gave the knight great opportuni- 
ties of shining, and of doing justice to Sir Richard 
Baker, who, as our knight observed with some 

5 surprise, had a great many kings in him whose 
monuments he had not seen in the Abbey. 

For my own part, I could not but be pleased to 
see the knight show such an honest passion for 
the glory of his country, and such a respectful 

10 gratitude to the memory of its princes. 

I must not omit that the benevolence of my 
good old friend, which flows out towards every one 
he converses with, made him very kind to our in- 
terpreter, whom he looked upon as an extraordi- 

15 nary man ; for which reason he shook him by the 
hand at parting, telling him that he should be 
very glad to see him at his lodgings in Norfolk 
buildings, and talk over these matters with him 
more at leisure. L. 



SIR ROGER AT THE PLAY. 211 



SIR ROGER AT THE PLAY. 
No. 335. 

Tuesday, March 25, 1712. 

Respicere exemplar vitae morumque jubebo 
Doctum imitatorem, et vivas hinc ducere voces. 

HOR. Ars Poet. 327. 

My friend Sir Roger de Coverley, when we last 
met together at the club, told me that he had a 
great mind to see the new tragedy with me, assur- 
ing me at the same time, that he had not been at 
a play these twenty years. " The last I saw," 5 
said Sir Roger, " was The Committee, which I 
should not have gone to neither, had I not been 
told beforeiiand that it was a good Church of 
England comedy." He then proceeded to inquire 
of me who this Distressed Mother was ; and upon 10 
hearing that she was Hector's widow, he told me 
that her husband was a brave man, and that when 
he was a school-boy he had read his life at the end 



212 SIR ROGER I)E COVE RLE Y PAPERS. 

of the dictionary. My friend asked me, in the 
next place, if there would not be some danger in 
coming home late, in case the Mohocks should be 
abroad. " I assure you," says he, " I thought I 

5 had fallen into their hands last night ; for I ob- 
served two or three lusty black men that followed 
me half way up Fleet street, and mended their 
pace behind me, in proportion as I put on to go 
away from them. You must know," continued 

10 the knight with a smile, "I fancied they had a 
mind to hunt me : for I remember an honest gen- 
tleman in my neighborhood, who was served such 
a trick in King Charles the Second's time ; for 
which reason he has not ventured himself in town 

15 ever since. I might have shown them very good 
sport, had this been their design ; for as I am an old 
fox-hunter, I should have turned and dodged, and 
have played them a thousand tricks they had never 
seen in their lives before." Sir Roger added that 

20 if these gentlemen had any such intention, they 
did not succeed very well in it ; " for I threw 
them out," says he, "at the end of Norfolk street, 
where I doubled the corner, and got shelter in my 
lodgings befoi-e they could imagine what was be- 



SIB ROGER AT THE PLAY. 213 

come of me. However," says the knight, " if 
Captain Sentry will make one witli us to-morrow 
night, and if you will both of you call upon me 
about four o'clock, that we may be at the house 
before it is full, 1 will have my own coach in read- 5 
iness to attend you, for John tells me he has got 
the fore- wheels mended." 

The captain, who did not fail to meet me there 
at the appointed hour, bid Sir Roger fear nothing, 
for that he had put on the same sword which he 10 
made use of at the battle of Steenkirk. Sir 
Roger's servants, and among the rest my old friend 
the butler, had, I found, provided themselves with 
good oaken plants, to attend their master upon 
this occasion. When he had placed him in his 15 
coach, with myself at his left hand, the captain 
before him, and his butler at the head of his 
footmen in the rear, we convoyed him in safety to 
the play-house ; where, after having marched up 
the entry in good order, the captain and I went in 20 
with him, and seated him betwixt us in the pit. 
As soon as the house was full and the candles 
lighted, my old friend stood up and looked about 
him with that pleasure which a mind seasoned 



214 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

with humanity naturally feels in itself, at the 
sight of a multitude of people who seem pleased 
with one another, and partake of the same common 
entertainment. I could not but fancy to myself, 

5 as the old man stood up in the middle of the pit, 
that he made a very proper centre to a tragic 
audience. Upon the entering of Pyrrhus, the 
knight told me that he did not believe the King 
of France himself had a better strut. I was, in- 

10 deed, very attentive to my old friend's remarks, 
because I looked upon them as a piece of natural 
criticism, and was well pleased to hear him at the 
conclusion of almost every scene, telling me that 
he could not imagine how the play would end. 

15 One while he appeared mucli concerned for Andro- 
mache ; and a little while after as much for Her- 
mione : and was extremely puzzled to think what 
would become of Pyrrhus. 

When Sir Roger saw Andromache's obstinate 

20 refusal to her lover's importunities, he whispered 
me in the ear that he was sure she would never 
have him ; to which he added, with a more than 
ordinary vehemence, " You cannot imagine, sir, 
what 'tis to have to do with a ^vidow." Upon 



SIR ROGER AT THE PLAY. 215 

Pyrrhiis's threatening afterwards to leave her, the 
knight shook iiis head and muttered to himself, 
" Ay, do if you can." This part dwelt so much 
on my friend's imagination, that at the close of 
the third act, as I was thinking of something else, 5 
he whispered in my ear, " These widows, sir, are 
the most perverse creatures in the world. But 
pray," says he, " you that are a critic, is this play 
according to your dramatic rules, as you call them ? 
Should your people in tragedy always talk to be lo 
understood ? Why, there is not a single sentence 
in this play that I do not know the meaning of." 

The fourth act very luckily began before I had 
time to give the old gentleman an answer. 
"Well," says the knight, sitting down with great 15 
satisfaction, " I suppose we are now to see Hec- 
tor's ghost." He then renewed his attention, and, 
from time to time, fell a-praising the widow. He 
made, indeed, a little mistake as to one of her 
pages, whom, at his first entering, he took for As- 20 
tyanax ; but he quickly set himself right in that 
particular, though, at the same time, he owned he 
should have been very glad to have seen the little 
boy, " who," says he, " must needs be a very fine 



216 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

child by the account tliat is given of him." Upon 
Hermione's going off with a menace to Pyrrhus, 
the audience gave a loud clap ; to which Sir 
Roger added, " On my word, a notable young 

5 baggage ! " 

As there was a very remarkable silence and 
stillness in the audience during the whole action, 
it was natural for them to take the o[)portunity of 
the intervals between the acts, to express their 

10 opinion of the players, and of their respective 
parts. Sir Roger, hearing a cluster of them praise 
Orestes, struck in with them, and told them that 
he thought liis friend Pylades was a very sensible 
man ; as they were afterwards applauding Pyrrhus, 

15 Sir Roger put in a second time, " And let me tell 
you," says he, " though he speaks but little, I 
like the old fellow in whiskers as well as any of 
them." Captain Sentry, seeing two or three wags 
who sat near us, lean with an attentive ear 

20 towards Sir Roger, and fearing lest they should 
smoke the knight, plucked him by the elbow, and 
whispered some tiling in his ear, that lasted till the 
opening of the fifth act. The knight was wonder- 
fully attentive to the account which Orestes gives 



SIR Roger at the flay. 217 

of Pyrrhus's death, and at the conclusion of it, 
told nie it was such a bloody piece of work that 
he was glad it was not done upon the stage. See- 
ing afterwards Orestes in his raving fit, he grew 
more than ordinary serious, and took occasion to 5 
moralize (in his way) upon an evil conscience, 
adding that " Orestes in his madness looked as 
if he saw something." 

As we were the first that came into the house, 
so we were the last that went out of it ; being re- 10 
solved to have a clear passage for our old friend, 
whom we did not care to venture among the jost- 
ling of the crowd. Sir Roger went out fully sat- 
isfied with his entertainment, and we guarded him 
to his lodgings in the same manner that we 15 
brought him to the play-house ; being highly 
pleased, for my own part, not only with the per- 
formance of the excellent piece which had been 
presented, but with the satisfaction which it had 
given to the good old man. L. 20 



218 SIE ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS, 



SIR ROGER AT SPRING GARDEN. 

No. 383. 

Tuesday, Marj 20, 1712. 

Criminibus debent hortos — 

JiTv. Sat. i. 75. 

As I was sitting in my chamber and thinking 
on a subject for my next Spectator^ I heard two or 
three irregular bounces at my landlady's door, and 
upon the opening of it, a loud, cheerful voice in- 

5 quiring whether the philosopher was at home. 
The child who went to the door answered very 
innocently that he did not lodge there. I immedi- 
ately recollected that it was my good friend Sir 
Roger's voice, and that I had promised to go with 

10 him on the water to Spring Garden, in case it 
pi'oved a good evening. The knight put me in 
mind of my promise from the bottom of the stair- 
case, but told me that if I was speculating he 
would stay below till I had done. Upon my 



SIE ROGER AT SPRING GARDEN. ^19 

coming doAvn, I found all the children of the 
family got about my old friend, and my land- 
lady herself, who is a notable prating gossip, 
engaged in a conference with him, being mightily 
pleased with his stroking her little boy upon the 5 
head, and bidding him be a good child and mind 
his book. 

We were no sooner come to the Temple stairs 
but we were surrounded by a crowd of watermen, 
offering us their respective services. Sir Roger, 10 
after having looked about him very attentively, 
spied one with a wooden leg, and immediately gave 
him orders to get his boat ready. As we were 
walking towards it, " You must know," says Sir 
Roger, " I never make use of anybody to row me 1.5 
that has not either lost a leg or an arm. I would 
rather bate him a few strokes of his oar than not 
employ an honest man that has been wounded 
in the Queen's service. If I was a lord or a 
bishop, and kept a barge, I would not put a fellow 20 
in my livery that had not a wooden leg." 

My old friend, after having seated himself, and 
trimmed the boat with his coachman, Avho, being 
a very sober man, always serves as ballast on 



'220 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

these occasions, we made the best of our way for 
Fox-hall. Sir Roger obliged the wateriiiaii to give 
us the history of his right leg, and hearing that he 
had left it at La Hogue, with many particulars 

5 which passed in that glorious action, the knight, 
in the triumph of his heart, made several reflec- 
tions on the greatness of the British nation ; as, 
that one Englishman could beat three Frenchmen ; 
that we could never be in danger of popery so 

10 long as we took care of our fleet; that the Thames 
was the noblest river in Europe ; that the London 
Bridge was a greater piece of work than any of 
the seven wonders of the world ; with many other 
honest prejudices which naturally cleave to the 

15 heart of a true Englishman. 

After some short pause, the old knight, turning 
about his head twice or thrice, to take a survey 
of this great metropolis, bid me observe how thick 
the city was set with churches, and that there was 

20 scarce a single steeple on this side Temple Bar. 
"A most heathenish sight!" says Sir Roger; "there 
is no religion at this end of the town. The fifty 
new churches will very much mend the prospect ; 
but church work is slow, church work is slow ! " 



SIR ROGER AT SPRING GARDEN. 221 

I do not remember I have anywhere mentioned 
in Sir Roger's character his custom of saluting 
everybody that passes by him with a good-morrow 
or a good-night. This the old man does out of 
the overflowings of his humanity, though at the 5 
same time it renders iiim so popular among all his 
country neighbors that it is thought to have gone 
a good way in making him once or twice knight 
of the sliire. 

He cannot forbear this exercise of benevolence lo 
even in town, when he meets with any one in his 
morning or evening walk. It broke from him to 
several boats that passed by us upon the water ; 
but to the knight's great surprise, as he gave the 
good-night to two or three young fellows a little 15 
before our landing, one of them, instead of return- 
ing the civility, asked us what queer old put we 
had in tlie boat, with a great deal of the like 
Thames ribaldry. Sir Roger seemed a little 
shocked at first, but at length, assuming a face of 20 
magistracy, told us that if he were a Middlesex 
justice, he would make such vagrants know that 
her Majesty's subjects were no more to be abused 
by water than by land. 



222 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

We were now arrived at Spring Garden, which 
is exquisitely pleasant at this time of the year. 
When I considered the fragrancy of the walks 
and bowers, with the choirs of birds that sung 

5 upon the trees, and the loose tribe of people that 
walked under their shades, I could not but look 
upon the place as a kind of Mahometan paradise. 
Sir Roger told me it put him in mind of a little 
coppice by his house in the country, which his 

10 chaplain used to call an aviary of nightingales. 
" You must understand," says the knight, " there 
is nothing in the world that pleases a man in love 
so much as your nightingale. Ah, Mr. Spectator ! 
the many moonlight nights that I have walked by 

15 myself and thought on the widow by the music of 
the nightingales ! " 

We concluded our walk with a glass of Burton 
ale and a slice of hung beef. When we had done 
eating, ourselves, the knight called a waiter to 

20 him and bid him carry tlie remainder to the 
waterman that had but one leg. I perceived the 
fellow stared upon him at the oddness of the mes- 
sage, and was going to be saucy, upon which I rati- 
fied the knight's commands with a peremptory look. 

I. 



TEE DEATH OF SIR ROGER. 223 



THE DEATH OF SIR ROGER. 
No. 517. 

Thursday, October 23, 1712. 

Heu pietas ! heu prisca fides ! 

ViKG. ^n. vi. 878. 

We last night received a piece of ill news at 
our club, which very sensibly afflicted every one 
of us. I question not but my readers themselves 
will be troubled at the hearing of it. To keep 
them no longer in suspense, Sir Roger de Coverley 5 
is dead. He departed this life at his house in the 
country, after a few weeks' sickness. Sir Andrew 
Freeport has a letter from one of his correspond- 
ents in those parts, that informs him the old man 
caught a cold at the county sessions, as he was 10 
very warmly promoting an address of his own 
penning, in which he succeeded according to his 
wishes. But this particular comes from a Whig 
justice of peace, who was always Sir Roger's 
enemy and antagonist. I have letters both from 15 



224 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

the chaplain and Captain Sentry, which mention 
nothing of it, but are filled with many particulars 
to the honor of the good old man. I have like- 
wise a letter from the butler, who took so much 

5 care of me last summer when I was at the 
knight's house. As my friend the butler men- 
tions, in the simplicity of his heart, several cir- 
cumstances the others have passed over in silence, 
I shall give my reader a copy of his letter, with- 

10 out auy alteration or diminution. 

" Honoured Sir, 
" Knowing that yon was my old master's good friend, 
I could not forbear sendino; you the melancholy news of 
his death, which has afflicted the whole country, as well as 

15 his poor servants, who loved him, I may say, better than 
we did our lives. I am afraid he caught his death the 
last county sessions, where he would go to see justice 
done to a poor widow woman and her fatherless children, 
that had been wronged by a neighbouring gentleman ; for 

20 you know my good master was always the poor man's 
friend. Upon his coming home, the first complaint he 
made was that he had lost his roast-beef stomach, not 
being able to touch a sirloin, which was served up ac- 
cording to custom ; and you know he used to take great 

25 delight in it. From that time forward he grew worse and 
worse, but still kept a good heart to the last. Indeed we 



THE DEATH OF SIR ROGER. 225 

were once in great hope of his recovery, upon a kind 
message that was sent him from the widow lady whom he 
had made love to the forty last years of his life ; but this 
only proved a lightning before his death. He has be- 
queathed to this lady, as a token of his love, a great pearl 5 
necklace and a couple of silver bracelets set with jewels, 
which belonged to my good old lad}^ his mother : he has 
bequeathed the fine white gelding that he used to ride 
a-hunting upon, to his chaplain, because he thought he 
would be kind to him, and has left you all his books. He 10 
has, moreover, bequeatlied to the (diajjlain a very pretty 
tenement with good lands about it. It being a very cold 
day when he made his will, he left for mourning, to every 
man m the parish, a great frieze coat, and to every woman 
a black riding-hood. It was a most moving sight to see 15 
him take leave of his poor servants, commending us all 
for our fidelity, whilst we were not able to speak a word 
for weeping. As we most of us are grown grey-headed in 
our dear master's service, he has left us pensions and 
legacies, which we may live very comfortably upon the 20 
remaining part of our days. He has bequeathed a great 
deal more in charity, which is not yet come to my knowl- 
edge, and it is peremptorily said in the parish that he has 
left money to build a steeple to the church ; for he was 
heard to say some time ago that if he lived two years 25 
longer, Coverley church should have a steeple to it. The 
chaplain tells every body that he made a very good end, 
and never speaks of him without tears. He was buried, 



226 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

according to his own directions, among the family of the 
Coverleys, on the left hand of his father Sir Arthur. The 
coffin was carried by six of his tenants, and the pall held 
up by six of the quorum : the whole parish followed the 

5 corpse with heavy hearts, and in their mourning suits ; the 
men in frieze, and the women in riding-hoods. Captain 
Sentry, my master's nephew, has taken possession of the 
hall-house and the whole estate. When my old master 
saw him, a little before his death, he shook him by the 

10 hand, and wished him joy of the estate which was falling 
to him, desiring him only to make a good use of it, and to 
pay the several legacies, and the gifts of charity, which 
he told him he had left as quit-rents upon the estate. 
The captain truly seems a courteous man, though he says 

15 but little. He makes much of those whom my master 
loved, and shows great kindness to the old house-dog, that 
you know my poor master was so fond of. It would have 
gone to your heart to have heard the moans the dumb 
creature made on the day of my master's death. He has 

20 never joyed himself since ; no more has any of us. It was 
the melancholiest day for the poor people that ever hap- 
pened in Worcestershire. This being all from 
♦« Honoured Sir, 

' ' Your most sorrowful servant, 

25 "EovTARD Biscuit." 

" P.S. My master desired, some weeks before he 
died, that a book which comes up to you by the carrier, 
should be given to Sir Andrew Freeport in his name." 



THE DEATH OF SIR ROGER. 227 

This letter, notwithstanding the poor butler's 
manner of writing it, gave us such an idea of our 
good old friend that upon the reading of it, there 
was not a dry eye in the club. Sir Andrew open- 

5 ing the book, found it to be a collection of acts of 
Parliament. There was, in particular, the Act 
of Uniformity, with some passages in it marked by 
Sir Roger's own hand. Sir Andrew found that 
they related to two or three points, which he had 

10 disputed with Sir Roger the last time he appeared 
at the club. Sir Andrew, who would have been 
merry at such an incident on another occasion, at 
the sight of the old man's handwriting, burst into 
tears, and put the book into his pocket. Captain 

15 Sentry informs me that the knight has left rings 
and mourning for every one in the club. O. 




From J. Rocque's Map of London in 1741-5. 



A. Buffon's Coffee House. . 

B. Will's Coffee House. 

D. St. James's Coffee House. 

E. The Grecian. 

F. The Cocoa Tree. 

G. Drury Lane Theater. 



H. Hay market Theater. 
K. Dick's Coffee House. 
L, Squire's Coffee House. 
M. Charter House. 
N. Gray's Inn. 
P. New Inn. 



S. Child's Coffee House. 



NOTES. 



No. 1. 

Motto ; 

'* One with a flash begins, and ends in smoke, 
The other out of smoke brings glorious light, 
And (without raising expectations high) 
Surprises us with dazzling miracles." 
Roscommon. 

Page 2, Line 20. depending. What do we say ? 

4, 12. to take the measure of a pyramid. Addison ridi- 
cules the controversy begun in the preceding century by 
John Greaves over the exact measurements of one of tlie 
pyramids. 

4, 23. Will's, Child's, etc. One cannot understand the 
age in which Addison and Steele wrote without taking into 
account the part which the coffee-houses played in the social, 
intellectual, and political life of the time. The history of the 
rise and growth of the institution forms an interesting chapter. 
The beginnings date back to a few years before the Restora- 
tion, when coffee is supposed to have been introduced into 
England by one Daniel Edwards, a Turkey merchant. 

So many people were eager to taste the new beverage that a 
coffee-room was opened in George Yard, Lombard Street, by 
229 



230 SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

Edwards's attendant. Soon others followed this example, and 
in spite of opposition, and even prohibitory legislation, popular 
feeling was so strongly in favor of them that they prospered 
and increased in number. 

Gradually, each coffee-house began to take on a character of 
Its own, according to the opinions or profession of those who 
gathered there. A man came to be known by the coffee-house 
he frequented. In Addison's time, the popularity of the insti- 
tution was at its height. The very name of Addison calls up 
the scene in Button's, where, surrounded by a circle of friends 
and admirers, he held his court. In the same way, before his 
reign, Dryden, and after it, Johnson held sway over their sub- 
jects in the world of letters. 

The coffee-houses were not, however, merely resorts where 
one could spend a pleasant hour among congenial companions ; 
they were a power. There, news from abroad and the gossip 
of the court were learned first-hand ; the rules of art and the 
laws of science were expounded by those who created the 
works of art and discovered the workings of natural law. 
Thus it was in the coffee-houses of London that opinions, 
tastes, manners, were formed, and the metropolis set the pace 
for the smaller cities and towns. In fact, the coffee-house of 
the eighteenth century wielded an influence similar to that of 
the modern newspaper, for, though there were newspapers so- 
called at that time, they neither furnished the most valuable and 
interesting news, nor exercised any considerable power. 

Steele informs us in The Tatter that the paper will comprise 
five departments : 

"All accounts of gallantry, pleasure, and entertainment 
shall be under the article of White's Chocolate-house ; poetry 
under that of Will's Coffee-house ; learning under the title 



NOTES. 231 

of Grecian ; foreign and domestic news you will have from 
St. ames's Coftee-liouse ; and what else I have to offer on 
any other subject shall be dated from my own apartment." 

In No. 1 of The Spectator Addison names the most noted 
of the coffee-houses of the day. 

4, 23. Will's was the coffee-house made famous by Dryden's 
frequenting it. In Addison's time it continued to be the resort 
of wits. Addison's reference to it as a resort of politicians 
shows how closely literature and politics were allied in those 
days. The coffee-house was named after the proprietor, Will 
Urwin. It stood on the north side of Russell Street at the end 
of Bow Street, near Drnry Lane Theatre. 21 Russell Street is 
doubtless one of the old buildings. — (Hutton.) 

5, 2. Child's. In St. Paul's Churchyard. Its proximity 
to the Cathedral, to the College of Physicians, and to the 
rooms of the Royal Society (Gresham College) made it the 
resort of clergymen, physicians, and philosophers. 

5, 6. St. James's. On St. James Street near the palace ; 
was frequented by Whig statesmen. 

5, 9. The Grecian. In Devereux Court, Strand, near the 
Temple, consequently frequented by lawyers. Its proprietor 
was Constantine, a Greek. 

5, 10. The Cocoa-Tree. A chocolate-house at 04 St. James's 
Street. The great Tory rendezvous and rival to St. James's. 
A Whig would not compromise himself by appearing there ; 
nor would a Tory show his face at St. James's. 

5, 14. Jonathan's. In Change Alley between Cornhill and 
Lombard Street. The Stock Exchange originated from meet- 
ings of brokers held here. 

5, 12. Exchange. The Royal Exchange, the heart of mer- 
cantile London ; first built in the reign of Elizabeth, rebuilt 



232 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

after the great fire of 1666 from designs by Sir Christopher 
Wren, and again rebuilt after a fire in 1838. 

5, 11. Drury Lane Theatre. The first Drury Lane Theatre 
was built on the present site in 1663. The second theatre, 
opened in 1674, was the theatre in Addison's time. The pres- 
ent theatre, which dates from 1809, is still one of the leading 
theatres of London. I'he theatre is only a stone's throw from 
the site of Will's, which was diagonally across Russell Street, 
and only a block beyond in Russell Street was Button's 
Coffee-house, which was the leading resort of Addison and a 
coterie of his admirers during the greater part of his London 
career. 

5, 11. The Haymarket. (Not the modern theatre of that 
name) was on the site of Iler Majesty's, corner of Haymarket 
and Pall Mall. It was opened in 1706, and came to be the 
home of Italian opera, which was just becoming popular ; 
Drury Lane was the home of the drama. 

5, 3. The Postman. A penny weekly paper, probably the 
best of the day. Edited by M. Fonvive, a French Protestant. 

6, 3. blots. A reference to the game of backgammon, in 
which exposed men are called blots. 

6, 6. Whigs and Tories. The time in which Addison lived 
was characterized by violent party spirit. The Whig 
party was a descendant of the Roundheads ; the Tory, of 
the Royalists. Similarly, the Liberal party has succeeded the 
Whig, and the Conservative, the Tory. In a general way, the 
Whigs stood for the authority of Parliament; the Tories for 
the prerogatives of the crown. Queen Anne was Stuart enough 
to be strongly Tory in her sympathies, but circumstances forced 
her to give the administration of affairs into the hands of Whig 
leaders during the greater part of her reign. Addison was one 



NOTES. 233 

of the chief Whig writers ; on the other side, the most power- 
ful opponent was Swift, 

8, 3. discoveries. In the earlier sense of revelations. 

8,14. Little Britain. "The Spectator in its first daily- 
issue was ' Printed for Sam. Buckley at the Dolphin, in Little 
Britain, and sold by A. Baldwin in Warwick Lane.' " 

Little Britain was at the tiuie of The Spectator the centre of 
the publishing business. (Read Irving's Little Britain in The 
Sketch Book.) It is a crowded street north of St. PauPs, 
leading from Aldersgate by St. Bartholomew's Hospital to 
Smithfield. (See map.) It is " now abandoned to city ware- 
housemen." Paternoster Row, not far off, is now the pub- 
lishing centre. Warwick Lane runs north from the west end 
of Paternoster Row to Newgate Street. It was named for the 
Earl of Warwick, "The King-maker," and hero of Bulwer's 
novel, The Last of the Barons, whose town house occupied this 
site. 

No. 2. 

Motto : 
" Six more at least join their consenting voice." 

9, 2. Worcestershire. A county in the west of England. 
The county, of diversified and picturesque scenery, is one of 
the most fertile and beautiful farming, gardening, and orchard 
regions of England. 

9, 3. Sir Roger de Coverley. Spelled Coverly on first ap- 
pearance of the paper, and also in the reprint. In No. 34 the 
original paper had Coverly and the reprint Coverley. In No. 
10(i and in subsequent jinmbers the spelling Coverley appeared 
in the original paper. 



234 SIR ROGER DE COYERLEY PAPERS. 

Sir Roger has been identified as Sir Jolm Parkington, of 
Westvvood, Worcestersliire. Tliere is no real foundation for 
the supposition that Sir John was the original of Sir Roger, or 
that Westwood was the place described by the Spectator as the 
home of the old baronet. See Nos. 34 and 262. 

Of course the origin of the dance given here is purely fanci- 
ful. The author adds interest to the character by connecting it 
with the name of a popular dance. It is stated on the authority 
of Steele that Swift suggested the use of the name. 

Baronet is the lowest order of hereditary title in Great 
Britain and Ireland. A baronet is not a peer and consequently 
has not a seat in the House of Lords. Baronets always have 
the title "Sir," which is also applied to knights. Knighthood 
is, however, not hereditary. 

10, 4. Soho Square, near Oxford Street, was at the time of 
Sir Roger's residence there a fashionable neighborhood. It 
' ' has now a French aspect from the number of French refugees 
who have settled there at different times. There are French 
schools, French names are over many of the shops, French 
restaurants with diners a la carte, and the organ-grinders of 
Soho find that the Marseillaise is the most lucrative tune to 
play." 

10, 5. by reason. Turn into present idiomatic English. 

10, 9-10. Rochester, Etherege. These were fashionable 
and dissipated wits during the Restoration period. 

Bully Dawson was a noted sharper and braggart. Acquaint- 
ance with these persons might constitute one's title to the rank 
of *' a fine gentleman." 

11, 14. Inner Temple. One of the inns of court or legal 
societies of London having the right to call law-students to the 
bar. Others are Middle Temple, Lincoln's Inn, Gray's Inn. 



NOTES. 235 

11, 22. Littleton and Coke. Authorities upon law before 
Blackstone's time. 

12, 6. Tully. The name by which Marcus Tullius Cicero 
was spoken of in Addison's time. 

12, 20. exactly at five. The dinner-hour and the hour for 
tlie play had been growing steadily later. Diu'ing the early 
Restoration period the play began early in the afternoon. At 
the time Steele writes, the hour was six. It was customary 
to spend an hour at the coffee-house before going to the 
play. 

12, 21. New Inn. Connected with the Middle Temple. 

12, 24. The Rose. A tavern in Covent Garden, adjoining 
Drury Lane Theatre. It was frequented by playwrights. 

13, 4. Sir Andrew Freeport. As Sir Roger represents the 
landed interest (Tory), Sir Andrew stands for the moneyed or 
commercial interest (Whig). Notice the significance of the 
names applied to the members of the club. 

14, 12. Captain Sentry. An original has been found for 
this character also, but there is 'even less reason to suppose 
that the author had any single person in mind than in the case 
of Sir Roger. 

17, 1. French king. This allusion is significant as showing 
the ascendancy of French modes and customs through the 
political ascendancy of France. This position was won by 
Louis XIV., " the Grand Monarch," the most powerful ruler 
in Europe. Just at this time, however, his power was suffer- 
ing from the disastrous defeats inflicted upon his armies by 
Marlborough and Prince Eugene. 

17, 10. Duke of Monmouth, favorite son of Charles II., and 
claimant to the throne in opposition to the Duke of York, 
afterwards James II. 



236 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



No. 6. 

Motto : 
" 'Twas impious then (so mucli was age rever'd) 
For youtli to keep their seats when an old man appear'd," 

21, 18. Lincoln's Inn Fields. Lincoln's Inn was one of 
the inns of conrt (see note on Inner Temple, p. 234). It was 
named after Henry de Lacy, the Earl of Lincoln, who built a 
mansion here in the time of Edward I. The square is called 
the Fields, and is one of the largest in London. Oliver Crom- 
well, Sir Thomas More, and Lord Erskine are a few of the 
famous men who have lived in this locality. 

23, 20. Sir Richard Blackmore. Physician and poet. His 
chief work is the Creation. 

No. 34. 



Motto : 
From spotted skins the leopard does refrain. 



Tate. 



28,14. opera and puppet-show. Addison had "taken 
liberties" with these in Nos. 5, 13, 14, 18. 

31, 18. Too fantastical, etc. In these lines we have the 
moral aim of The Spectator expressed in brief. 

33, 6. Punch. The chief character in the puppet-show, a 
favorite amusement of the time. It may be familiar to some 
readers as the "Punch -and- Judy Show." 

33,21. and with a love to mankind. As in a preceding 
paragi-aph in this paper we have the aim of The Spectator, so 
in this concluding passage we have the spirit in which the 
work was undertaken. 



NOTES. 237 



No. 37. 



Motto : 
" Unbred to spinning, in the loom unskill'd." 

Dry den. 

36, 14. Ogilby's Virgil. John Ogilby translated both Vir- 
gil and flomer into English verse. The Virgil appeared in 
1649. 

36, 15. Dryden's Juvenal. John Dryden was the chief 
poet and man of letters of the Restoration. His chief poems 
are satires, the best of which is Absalom and Achitophel. He 
was still living in Addison's time, and had taken some notice 
of Addison's early work. Dryden's Juvenal, which he trans- 
lated with several others, appeared in 1G93. 

36, lG-18. Cassandra, Cleopatra, and Astraea were French 
romances, translated into English and very popular at this 
time. 

36, 19. Sir Isaac Newton. The famous English scientist, 
whose chief fame rests upon his discovery of the law of gravi- 
tation. He died in 1727, so was living during the first part of 
Addison's life. 

36, 20. The Grand Cyrus and Clelia, two very popular 
French romances of the time by Magdeleine de Scud^ri. 

36, 21. Arcadia, pastoral romance by Sir Philip Sidney, 
the famous gentleman and scholar of Elizabeth's time. It is 
called the Pembroke Arcadia, because first published by his 
sister, the Countess of Pembroke. 

36, 22. Locke, John. Celebrated English philosopher 
(1632-1704). He was evidently a favorite with Addison. 
Locke's chief work is the one contained in Leonard's library. 



288 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 

37, 1. Sherlock, Dr. William. Dean of St. Paul's, whose 
works were very popular. 

37, 3. Sir William Temple. Statesman and essayist (1628- 
1699). Swift was distantly related to him, and spent his early 
life in Temple's household. 

37, 4. Malebranche. Famous French philosopher of Addi- 
son's time. His most celebrated work is the one mentioned. 
Addison met Malebranche in France. 

37, 9. D'Urfey, Thomas. A favorite of Charles II. and 
writer of plays and songs. His works were as licentious as 
most of the Restoration literature. 

37, 15. Baker's Chronicle. Chronicle of the Kings of Eng- 
land, from the Time of the Romans^ Government unto the Death 
of King James, by Sir Richard Baker. This work and others 
were written in the Fleet prison. 

37, 17. The New Atlantis, by Mary Manley, was a book 
which, under feigned names, related the scandal of the time, 
particularly that in connection with the prominent Whig 
families. 

37, 18. Steele's Christian Hero. See p. xiv. of Introduc- 
tion. 

37, 21. Sacheverell was an English clergyman who brought 
himself into prominence through two sermons in which he 
criticised the Whig ministry. He was prosecuted and sus- 
pended for three years, but was afterwards reinstated by the 
Tory ministry. The attack upon Sacheverell aroused so much 
feeling that a reaction set in against the Whig party, then in 
power. 

37, 22. Fielding's Trial probably refers to the account of 
the trial for bigamy of Robert Fielding, called Beau Fielding, a 
notorious character of the time of Charles II. 



NOTES. 239 

37, 23. Seneca's Morals. Seneca, a Roman Stoic philoso- 
pher and writer of plays (4 i3.c.-65 a.d.). He was the tutor 
of the young Nero. 

37, 24. Taylor's Holy Living and Dying. One of the most 
powerful religious works of the centmy, written by Jeremy 
Taylor (1613-1667), an English bishop. 

37, 25. La Ferte, a popular dancing-master of the time. 

Notice the arrangement of these works. 

39, 8. turtles, turtledoves. 



No. 101. 

Motto : 

imitated. 

' Edward and Henry, now the boast of fame, 
And virtuous Alfred, a more sacred name, 
After a life of geu'rous toil endur'd, 
The Gauls subdued, or property secur'd. 
Ambition humbled, mighty cities storm'd, 
Our laws establish'd and the world reform'd. 
Closed their long glories with a sigh, to find 
Th' unwilling gratitude of base mankind." 



Pope. 



41, 1-3. The quotation is from Swift. 

43, 22. recentibus odiis. This is best translated by the 
folio wiug phrase, " with the passions and prejudices of a con- 
temporary author." 

46, 13. puppet-show, in No. 14 ; by their patches, in No. 
81; in a language, etc., in No. 18; as actors upon the British 
stage, in Nos. 22 and 36. 



240 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



No. 106. 

Motto : 
" Here plenty's liberal horn shall pour 
Of fruits for thee a copious shower, 
Rich honors of the quiet plain." 

50, 10. is pleasant upon, jokes. The same meaning ap- 
pears in the noun jAeasantry. 

51, 22. insulted with Greek and Latin. For the state of 
learning among country gentlemen in the seventeenth century, 
see Macaulay's England, Vol. I. chap, iii., from which we 
quote : " Many lords of manors had received an education 
differing little from that of their menial servants. The heir of 
an estate often passed his boyhood and youth at the seat of his 
family, with no better tutors than grooms and gamekeepers, 
and scarce attained learning enough to sign his name to a 
mittimus." 

53, 11. Bishop of St. Asaph, etc. — Noted divines and 
theologians of the preceding century. Calamy, says Morley, 
"became chaplain to Charles II., but the Act of Uniformity 
again made him a seceder. His name, added to the other three, 
gives breadth to the suggestion of Sir Roger's orthodoxy." 

No. 107. 

Motto -. 
" The Athenians erected a large statue to ^sop and placed him, 
though a slave, on a lasting pedestal : to show the way to honor lies 
open indifferently to all." 

58, 8. a large fine when a tenement falls. The fine paid 
when a tenant allows his rent to depreciate in value. 



NOTES. 241 



No. 108. 

Motto : 
*• Out of breath to no purpose, and very busy about nothing." 

62, 3. Will Wimble. A wimble is a tool for boring. 

63, 5. Eton, in Buckinghamshire, one of the great pre- 
paratory schools of England, founded in 1441, by Henry VI. 
It has educated many eminent men, among them Lord Boling- 
broke, Chatham, Shelley, and the Duke of Wellington. 

63, 25. officious, in the now obsolete sense of obliging. 

64, 4. tulip root. The interest in tulips, which in the 
preceding century had been a mania, had not yet died out. 
Holland was the original home of the tulip mania. 

66, G. quail-pipe. A call for alluring quail into a net. 

67, 22. twenty-first speculation. In this paper, which it 
would be well to read, Addison speaks of the crowding in the 
professions. 

No. 109. 

Motto : 
" Of plain good sense, untutor'd in the schools." 

69, 21. Whitehall. The site of this historic place is be- 
tween the Thames and St. James Park, just north of Westmin- 
ster. The palace which stood here was first known as York 
Place, and was the residence of Wolsey, Archbishop of York, 
afterwards Cardinal. When Wolsey fell, his palace came into 
the hands of his sovereign, Henry VIII., and was known from 
that time as Whitehall. (See Shakespeare's Henry VIII., Act 
IV., Sc. 1.) It was Henry who formed close to the palace the 



2-J:2 SUi KOGEli DE COVEELEY PAPERS. 

Tilt-yard referred to in the text, as a place where noblemen 
might exercise themselves in joust and tourney. The coffee- 
house mentioned in p. 70, 1. 13 is Jenny Mann's Tilt-yard 
Coffee-house. 

From the time of Henry VIII. to that of James II., White- 
hall Palace continued to be a royal residence, and was the 
scene of the triumphs, the tragedy, and the shame of English 
monarchy. James I. rebuilt the Banquet House, which is the 
only part now remaining. In front of the Banquet House 
Charles I. met his death. Both Cromwell and Charles II. died 
in Whitehall. All but the Banquet House was destroyed by 
two lires, the last in 1698. 

71, 8. White-pot, a kind of baked custard. 

No. 110. 

Motto ; 
'« All things are full of horror and affright, 
And dreadful ev'n the silence of the night." 

Dryden. 

75, 10. language of the Psalms : Ps. cxlvii. 9. It might 
be interesting to read in this connection Addison's Paraphrase 
of the Twenty -third Psalm, 

No. 112. 

Motto : 
" First, in obedience to thy country's rites, 
Worship th' immortal gods." 

81, 12. the church. It is thought that Addison had in 
mind, as he wrote this description, the little church at Milston, 
Wiltshire, which his father held at the lime Joseph was born. 
The parsonage adjoined the churchyard. 



NOTES. 243 



No. 113. 

Motto : 
" Her looks were deep imprinted in his heart." 

93, 22. tansy : a dish common in the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries, made of eggs, cream, sugar, rosewater, 
tansy, and other herbs. 



No. 114. 



Motto : 

" The dread of nothing more 
Than to be thought necessitous and poor." 

Pooly. 

97, 8. dipped : mortgaged. 

98, 19. Laertes : the father of Odysseus. 

99, 2. Irus : the beggar whom Odysseus is forced to con- 
tend with at his own house on his return in the disguise of a 
beggar. 

101, 17. Cowley, Abraham. English poet (1618-1667). 
His fame was much greater during his life and immediately 
after his death than it has been since. It was still high when 
Addison wrote. By some Cowley was considered a greater 
poet than Milton. The quotation is from the Essay on the 
Banger of Procrastination : "There's no fooling with life when 
it is once turned beyond forty." 



244 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 



No. 115. 

Motto : 
" Pray for a sound mind in a sound body." 

104, 6. spleen. The spleen was formerly regarded as the 
seat of the emotions ; then it came to mean a particular state 
of mind, melancholy, the sense in which the word is used 
here. 

107, 8. Dr. Sydenham. A noted English physician of the 
seventeenth century, who made many valuable contributions 
to medical science. In our own century a society of physi- 
cians, called the Sydenham Society, was formed for the purpose 
of republishing the works of Sydenham and others. 

107, 12. Medicina Gymnastica. A treatise concerning the 
power of exercise, as the full title of the work states, written 
by Francis Fuller, M.A. 



No. 116. 

Motto : 
"The echoing hills and chiding hounds invite." 

116, 10 Paschal, Blaise. French mathematician, philos- 
opher, and author of the seventeenth century. While he was 
yet a young man, a stroke of paralysis attacked him, and fi-om 
that time until his death he was a constant sufferer. The 
seriousness of mind caused by his suffering led to a corre- 
sponding seriousness in his life and studies. 



NOTES. 245 



No. 117. 

Motto : 
" With voluntary dreams they cheat their minds." 

121, 4. Otway. A seveuteenth century poet. Most of his 
works took the form of dramas. The quotation is from tlie 
drama, The Orphan. 

124, 10. Scarce a village in England. See Morley's note 
in his edition of The Sj^ectator for tlie extent of superstition at 
this time. 

No. 119. 

Motto : 
•' The city men call Rome, unskilful clown, 
I thought resembled this our humble town." 

War ton. 
130, 5. height of their headdresses. See No. 98. 

No. 120. 

Motto : 
— - " I deem their breasts inspired 
With a divine sagacity " — 

No. 121. 

Motto : 
♦' — All things are full of Jove." 

139, 4. Bayle. Seventeenth century French philosopher 
and critic. His chief work is the Dictionnaire hlstorique et 



246 SIR ROGER DE COVERLET PAPERS. 

critique, which is quoted here. He has been called the 
"Shakespeare of Dictionary Makers." 

139, 12. Dampier, William. An English explorer and 
author. (1652-1715.) Most of his life he spent upon the 
sea, part of the time upon piratical expeditions. The quota- 
tion is from A Voyage Round the World. He has given his 
name to an archipelago, a strait, an island, and a part of 
Australia. 

142,11. Cardan. An Italian philosopher, physician, mathe- 
matician, and astrologer of the sixteenth century. 

143, 22. Boyle, Robert. British philosopher and chemist, 
celebrated as the discoverer of the law of the elasticity of air 
(hence known as Boyle's Law) and as the founder of the 
lectm-es for the defence of Christianity, London. 

144, 22. The Royal Society. This famous association for 
the advancement of science was founded about 1660. Its 
membership has included the names of the foremost scientists 
of Great Britain. 

No. 122. 

Motto : 
•' An agreeable compauion vipon the road is as good as a coach." 

148, 15. Just within the Game Act. According to this act 
no one who had not an income of £40 per annum or £200 
worth of goods and chattels could shoot game ; and any person 
having an income of £100 per annum could take from such 
malefactor his guns, bows, etc. This law was in force as late 
as 1827. 

149, 11. cast and been cast. Won and lost in a law-suit. 



NOTES. 247 



No. 123. 



Motto : 

*' Yet the best blood by learning is refined, 
And virtue arms the solid mind ; 
Whilst vice will stain the noblest race, 
And the paternal stamp efface." 

Oldistvorth. 

156, 21. The Gazette. The official journal of the govern- 
ment. Steele was appointed Gazetteer in 1707 and held the 
office till 1710. According to Macaulay it was the fact that 
Steele in this position had access to foreign news earlier than 
most newswriters that led him to publish The Tatler (see 
Introduction). 



No. 125. 

Motto : 

*• This thirst of kindred blood, my sons, detest. 
Nor turn your force against your country's breast." 

Drijden. 

163, 8. St. Anne's Lane. Probably the one turning out 
of Great Peter Street, Westminster. 

168, 8. Guelphs and Ghibellines. The two rival parties 
in Italy during the Middle Ages. The Guelphs were the 
papal party; the Ghibelliues the imperial. Dante was first 
on the side of the former, then tried to reconcile the two, 
but failed. 



248 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 



No. 126. 

Motto : 

•' Rutulians, Trojans are the same to me." 

Dry den. 

172, 7. Diodorus Siculus. Diodorus of Sicily, a Greek 
historian of second half of first century b.c. His work is 
called an Historical Library, and consists of forty books, only a 
portion, however, being complete. 



No 130. 

Motto : 

" A plundering race, still eager to invade, 
On spoil they live, and make of theft a trade." 

177, 3. Gypsies, a corruption of the word Egyptians, for of 
such nationality were these strange people supposed to be. It 
would be interesting to read the account of this people in the 
Encyc. Brit. In Scott's Quentin Durward we get interesting 
glimpses of the life, character, and standing of these wanderers 
as they appeared in the fifteenth century in France. 

179, 4. Cassandra. The daughter of Priam, king of Troy. 
She was a favorite of Apollo and was given the gift of 
prophecy, but having offended the god, was doomed never to 
be believed. She was carried to Mycense by Agamemnon on 
his return from the Trojan war, and prophesied the evil fate 
which was to overtake him ; but he, like the rest, put no faith 
in her forebodings, and rushed to his destiny. 



NOTES. 249 



No. 131. 

Motto : 
•' Once more, ye woods, adieu." 

185, 5. In the same manner. Cf. 05, 11. No. 108. 

185, 20. Cities of London and Westminster. Old London 
consisted of what is now the eastern end of the city and was 
bounded by gates, the names of which survive in Ludgate, 
Aldersgate, Newgate, etc. Westminster Abbey being the 
cathedral of a diocese, the locality about it was called a city, 
according to English usage. Temple Bar marks the eastern 
boundary of Westminster. As Loudon and Westminster 
approached each other, London came to be known as " the 
city within the gates," and Westminster as "the city without 
the gates." In Addison's time the two parts of London were 
not so completely one as they are now. 

186,18. White Witch. "According to popular belief, 
there were three classes of witches : white, black, and gray. 
The first helped, but could not hurt ; the second, the reverse ; 
and the third did both. White spirits caused stolen goods to 
be restored ; they charmed away diseases, and did other 
beneficent acts ; neither did a little harmless mischief lie 
wholly out of their way." — G. W. Greene's edition of The 
Spectator. 

187, 3. Converses. In the now archaic sense of asso- 
ciates. 



250 SIR EOGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



No. 132. 

Motto : 

" That man may be called impertinent wlio considers not the circum- 
stances of time, or engrosses the conversation, or makes hinjself the 
subject of his discourse, or pays no regard to the company he is vn." 

191, 3. Ephraim. " The children of Ephraim being armed 
and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle." Ps. 
Ixxviii. 

191, 17. Half-pike. A spearing-weapon with a staff about 
half as long as a pike. 

193, 3. Brideman. We should say groomsman. 

194, 19. Smoky, suspicious. 



No. 2G9. 

Motto : 

•' Most rare is now oiir old simplicity." 

Dryden. 

197, 11. Gray's Inn Walks. A favorite promenade. Upon 
the upper walk, or terrace, was a sun-dial upon a stone pedes- 
tal. Round this were seats arranged in a semicircle. The 
gardens were a favorite resort of thieves and beggars, as well 
as more respectable folk. 

198, 2. Prince Eugene. This visit took place only a few 
days after Marlborough, who had been associated with Prince 
Eugene in the victories of the War of the Spanish Succession, 
had been dismissed from office. One of the objects of the 



NOTES. 251 

visit was Marlborough's restoration to favor, which, however, 
could not be accomplished. Prince Eugene was most enthusi- 
astically received, but before he left, the Tories, who feared 
the effect of his popularity upon the standing of Marlborough, 
heaped abuse upon him. This treatment is a notable illus- 
tration of the evils of party spirit to which Addison has 
referred, 

198, 9. Scanderbeg. Iskander Bey (George Castriota), 
Albanian commander of the 15th century, who resisted suc- 
cessfully the encroachments of the Ottoman court. See 
Spanish Jew's second tale in Tales of a Waijside Inn, 
Part III. 

201, 14. the Late Act of Parliament. The act against 
Occasional Conformity, that is, against the provision according 
to which dissenting clergymen received the sacrament of the 
Church once a year, in order to qualify for office. The Act 
was a Tory measure. 

202, 6. Pope's Procession. The celebration which took 
place upon the anniversary of Elizabeth's accession (Nov. 17). 
This particular celebration which Sir Roger refers to is that 
of 1711. The Whigs had planned a pageant of unusual 
splendor. The Tories, animated by the malice of party spirit, 
circulated all sorts of wild rumors to the effect that violence 
and outbreak following upon the pageant were part of the 
Whigs' plans. In consequence, the gorgeous paraphernalia 
were seized by constables, and the procession never took 
place. 

203, 2. Squire's. A coffee-house near Gray's Inn, and 
therefore frequented chiefly by la>w-students and barristers. 



252 SIR ROGER BE COVERLET PAPERS. 



No. 329. 

Motto : 
" With Ancus and -witli Numa, kings of Rome, 
We must descend into tlie silent tomb." 

< 

205, 22. Sickness at Dantzic. The plague of 17^9, 
207, 10. Sir Cloudesley Shovel. One of England's great 
admirals. See No. 26 of The Spectator. 

207, 13. Busby. Head master of Westminster School for 
fifty-five years. He was famous for the number of eminent 
scholars he sent out, and for his frequent and severe use of the 
rod. 

208, 1. Cecil. William Cecil, Lord Burleigh, Elizabeth's 
Secretary of State. 

208, 3. Martyr to good housewifery. Elizabeth, daughter 
of Lord John Russell. Stanley, in his Memorials of Westmin- 
ster Abbeij, says: " She died of consumption, a few days after 
the marriage of her sister Anne at Blackfriars, at which the 
queen attended, as represented in the celebrated Shelborne 
Castle picture. Such was her real end. But the form of her 
monument has bred one of the ' vulgar errors ' of Westminster 
mythology. Her finger pointing to the skull, the emblem of 
mortality at her feet, had already, within seventy years from 
her death, led to the legend that she had ' died of the prick of 
a needle,' sometimes magnified into a judgment on her for 
working on Sunday." 

208, 13. the stone. The famous stone of Scone which 
plays such a prominent part in the legend and history of Scot- 
land. It was supposed to have been brought to Scotland by 
Fergus. While it was in the possession of the Scots, it was 



NOTES. 253 

used in the coronation ceremony. Since Edward I. brought it 
to England, it has been used in tlie English coronation cere- 
mony. Why are there two coronation chairs ? 

209, 5. Edward III.'s sword. This sword is seven feet 
long, and weighs eighteen pounds. 

209, 13. king's evil. Scrofula ; called king''s evil because 
it was supposed that it could be cured by the touch of the royal 
hand. Queen Anne was the last sovereign who pretended to 
exercise the power. It is noteworthy that Dr. Samuel Johnson 
recalled that as a small boy he was taken before the queen to 
be cured. 

209, 19. king without a head. Henry V. The head of 
the figure was of solid silver, the rest being plated. 

It might be interesting to read the description of the Abbey 
in Baedeker's Handbook of London, parts of Stanley's Memo- 
rials of Westminster Abbey ^ and No. 26 of The Spectator. 



No. 335. 

Motto : 

" Keep Nature's great original in view, 
And thence the living images pursue." 

Francis. 

211, 3. The New Tragedy. Ambrose Phillips's The Dis- 
tressed Mother, a translation of Racine's Andromaque. 

211, 6. The Committee. A comedy by Sir Robert Howard, 
which appeared early in the Restoration period. In it the 
Roundheads were held up to ridicule, and we can see, there- 
fore, why Sir Roger should call it a "good Church-of-England 
comedy." 



254 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

212, 3. Mohocks. One of the numerous bands of wild 
young men which infested the streets of London at this time, 
terrifying and sometimes doing violence to unprotected passers- 
by. One of their favorite amusements was putting defenceless 
women into barrels and rolling them down hill. A royal proc- 
lamation was issued against them just a few days before the 
appearance of this paper. 

213, 11. Steenkirk. One of the battles lost by the Allies 
to the French. The battle took place in Flanders. A fash- 
ionable neckcloth, which imitated the disordered dress of the 
French generals, who hastily prepared for battle, was named 
the Steenkirk, and, strangely enough, became the mode in 
England, as well as in France. 

214, 7. Pyrrhus, Andromache, etc. Pyrrhus (Neoptole- 
mus), the son of Achilles, forced Andromache, the widow of 
Hector, the great Trojan prince, to become his wife at the end 
of the Trojan war. Andromache's feelings may be understood 
when we recall that Hector had fallen under Achilles' spear. 
Pyrrhus afterwards married Hermione, daughter of Menelaus 
and Helen. He loved Hermione before he married Androm- 
ache, but she had become the wife of Orestes, son of Aga- 
memnon. In order to make her his wife, Pyrrhus slew Orestes. 
Py lades is the friend of Orestes. The play which Sir Roger 
sees is based on these circumstances. 

No. 383. 

Motto : 
" A beauteous garden, but by vice maiutain'd." 

218, 10. Spring Garden. Here, the New Spring Garden 
situated on the Thames just above the Lambeth Palace. It 



NOTES. 255 

is distinguished from the Old Spring Garden in St. James's 
Park. Both were popular places of resort iu the eighteenth 
century. The former was also called Vauxhall, or Fox Hall, 
from Foukes de Brent, who, through his marriage with the 
Countess of Albemarle, came into possession of the property. 
The site of the gardens is now built over. 

219, 8. The Temple. A collection of buildings containing 
the principal " Inns of Court." The buildings get their name 
from the Knights Templars, who had their residence here from 
1184 to 1313. At the downfall of the order, the property passed 
to the Knights of John of Jerusalem, who leased the Inner and 
Middle Temples to law students. Later the buildings fell to 
the Crown, and then in turn were settled upon the legal 
societies, or "Inns of Court." 

Temple Bar is the site where formerly stood a bar, posts, 
and chains to mark the boundary between London and West- 
minster (see note on No. 131 ; p. 185, 20). This old gate was 
taken down after the fire (16G6), and in 1670 a modern gate 
erected. Both on the old and on the new gate the heads of 
traitors were displayed, this custom being practised as late as 
1773. It was formerly the custom to close the gates of the 
city and not admit the sovereign until the mayor had given 
his permission. This ceremony was performed in 1844, when 
Queen Victoria passed through to open the Eoyal Exchange. 

220, 4. La Hogue. English and Dutch victory over the 
French (1692). La Hogue is a fort in La Manche, France, on 
the English Channel. 

220, 11. London Bridge. The first bridge built across the 
Thames. The original structure was destroyed in 1091 and 
was replaced by one of stone foundations. The present bridge 
called by this name was finished in 1831, and is a little above 



256 SIR ROGER BE COVERLEY PAPERS. 

the site of the old bridge, which was left standing till 1832. It 
is a magnificent stone structure, 920 feet long, 56 feet wide, 
and 55 feet high. It is estimated that about 8000 pedestrians 
and 900 vehicles pass over it every hour. 

No. 517. 

Motto : 
" Mirror of ancient faith ! 
Undaunted worth ! Inviolable truth ! " 

Dry den. 

223, 5. Sir Roger de Coverley is dead. Addison is reported 
as saying, " I'll kill Sir Roger, that nobody else may murder 
him." 

227, C. Act of Uniformity. One of the severe laws passed 
during the reign of Charles II. against Dissenters. This Act 
compelled all clergymen and congregations to use the Episcopal 
prayer-book. 



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